2nd Week of February

Woo! If you saw my desk right now…wait! You couldn’t see my desk right now because it is stacked with about three feet of homework. This would have to be my best reason for not delivering a blog for two weeks. I really would like to apologize, but I think if you’ve ever been to high school (in Nepal, my SLC’s would be coming up in about a year) or school, at all, you know that juggling things can be very hard and sometimes you lose grip of things and they all fall down. Well, I’ve been trying very hard to make sure everything stays tip-top applesause and now, with a little extra time on my hands, am ready to write my blog for the second week of the month of love.

Have you guys noticed the weather lately? It is exactly like Texas to give us 75 degrees one day and 18 the next. As I’m writing this, I’m sniffling and running to the bathroom to get tissues every sentence. This is the first time this week, either. Just in one week, I’ve been run down with the cold twice. But, as I look out at the sky now, it seems like it’s a perfect day for the Superbowl, huh? More about that later:)

Last week, in English, we started the epic tale of Romeo and Juliet. If you haven’t read this story yet, or read it twenty years ago, here’s a recap: Romeo and Juliet come from the two battling families: Montagues and Capulets, who hate each other. While at a party, they fall in love, but their parents won’t let them be. In the end, Juliet fakes her death, but Romeo thinks she actually died, so he kills himself. When Juliet finds out that Romeo has died, she kills herself. For real, this time. The Montagues and Capulets stop fighting. The end.

The book itself is much more interesting than my oh, so “detailed” summary. You have to read it to believe it. Boys, no Romeo and Juliet is not only about love. It’s a tragedy between star-crossed lovers with fight scenes (!!) and lots of disturbing moments.

Anywho, on to my blog this week. Before we started reading the actual story of R & J, we wrote sonnets. Shakespeare, who is the author of Romeo and Juliet, wrote about 157 sonnets in his lifetime. What exactly is a sonnet, you may be asking? A sonnet is a poem, with limits. No, it’s not just a bunch of rhyming words. Even though there are rhyming words, a sonnet is very special. These are the things my teacher required for us to have in our sonnets:

1. There must be 14 lines.
2. There must be 10 syllables in each line.
3. The first and third and the second and fourth syllable must rhyme in each stanza.
4. The stanzas must be: four lines, four lines, four lines, and two lines.
5. The last two lines must rhyme.
6. The rhyme could have been eye rhymes, which are words that look like they’re going to rhyme, but don’t.
(EX: daughter and laughter, rain and again, game and sesame, etc.)

Let me show you guys an example for a poem I did:

Once| u|pon| a| time,| there| was| you| and| I
We meant to be forever and a day
But each day a new part of me would die
This story started on the first of May

Line 5: A flurry of smoke, you described my eyes,
Line 6: With a hint of light somewhere hard to find
Line 7: Our hands fit together in grim surprise
Line 8: But you and I could never be one mind

After throwing pebbles at my window
Even on days when the sun did not shine
Father told you repeatedly to “Go”
He said Juliet would always be mine

Line 13: Now I’ll be waiting under the altar
Line 14:Crying for happily ever after.

Alright, so in our example, count up the lines. There are fourteen. Also, the first line is divided with these “|”. That represents the syllables. If you count the syllables, you’ll notice there are ten. If you want, count any other line’s syllables. They will all have 10 syllables. Next, I have bolded and itilacized words. The bold words rhyme (in each stanza only) and the italic words rhyme (in each stanza only). I have also written Line 13, Line 14, etc. There are four lines each in the first three stanzas and two lines in the last stanza, resulting in a total of 14 lines and 4 four stanzas. The last two lines must rhyme, I say. I’m going to mix this rule in with the sixth rule. I said we can use eye rhymes and I did that here. Altar and after don’t really rhyme, but they look like they’re going to.

So there you have it. Now you know how to make a sonnet! Here are two examples from me!

A tree is like a mother’s loving grasp
The vines and twines tangled between her thumbs
Strong and firm when her hands are in a clasp
Casting fingerprints that can ease the numb

As they search for sorrow between the lines
Or cover her mouth at times she commands
Somehow she gets through all the trying times
Nothing can compare to my mother’s hands

When she rips the bandage neatly in two
And places it carefully on my wounds
To keep me from turning blue,
She blows away pain with whistling sounds

Mother is the bravest woman I know
She helps me with all my tasks and to grow

And another one:

When we met in the fourth grade by the pond,
You told me our friendship had just begun
Swinging in the swings we had a great bond
And all our times are memories of fun

But alas on the day of Christmas Eve,
You took a knife and stabbed me through the heart
And as I sit now, quietly and grieve,
I realize neither of us was smart

I stole all your money, wasted your life,
Bewitched your love to fall with me instead
You took away my father and his wife
Not just that, but the man I was to wed

Now that we’ve both caused each other sorrow,
May the best woman win this tomorrow.

Word of the Week
stanza (noun)
1. an arrangement of a certain number of lines.

Fun Challenge
Hey! Do you think you can write a sonnets? Try! I’ll post it on here. Just remember, sonnets have to be about something that’s very emotional to you.

Quick Question
Who won Superbowl? First person to get the correct answer gets their name written in next week’s blog.