Here's a quick reminder of the Triolet form in case you missed first post by Kborsden
The triolet is somewhat of a rarity, maybe because some incorrectly see it as little more than a shorter (and therefore also easier) version of a pantoum or villanelle. This
poem and thread sparked an idea - we've had the Haiku Chain (many of them), the Cinquain Train (2 I know of), now I'd like to suggest the first Triolet Trail.
A triolet is a poem consisting of two stanzas of four verses each (8 verses in total) - however the metric count is independent of the form, so tetrameter, pentameter, hexameter, heptameter, octameter etc all acceptable, even in alternation or each verse its own - but anything above hexameter would be rather imposing to come across and quite a challenge to write (especially, say, octameter). The tri (3) in the triolet is reference to the first verse appearing 3 times: verse 1, verse 4, verse 7. Additionally the 2nd verse is repeated also as the final verse and the rhyme scheme is strict ABAA ABAB. Sometimes stanzas are presented as a single merged stanza - as I suggest we do in this thread.
So as to function for a game - the 2nd verse which is repeated as the last verse of every triolet will function as the first verse of the following triolet - a visual diagram to elucidate:
(number is the verse in repetition, x is non repeated verse, letter is rhyme)
1A
2B
xA
1A
xA
xB
1A
2B
Every new post will use verse 2 of the previous poem as verse 1... does that make sense?
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As a show of good will - and because I just have to, I'll go first:
For a time, watching the willow,
enveloped in its obscure gloves:
green snakes that catch the soft billows
for a time. Watching the willow
in sights caught close in cloud pillows
as precedents of lucid love --
for, a time, watching the willow
enveloped in its obscured gloves.
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