A billion Civilians In vermilion Pavilions Are waiting for the dawn.
Instead, Overhead, From his bed On skies of lead, God said the wars must go on.
The Blessed Drops shed From side and head Of Christ dead Beloved but forlorn,
Watered The slaughtered And caught by Those who fought at Zama and the Somme.
Inconclusive, Thought-inducive, Why-elusive… But, if you sieve War’s truths long,
You’ll find You’re refined And the blind Are undermined By the kind who throng
To the place Of loving grace The gentlest face The human race Has ever looked upon:
The Crucified Who never shied From Truth and died: From head and side Drops fall and spawn
A billion Civilians In vermilion Pavilions Waiting for the dawn.
*****
I wrote this in an experimental frame of mind some 50 years ago. It doesn’t reflect my religious beliefs or lack thereof. Take it as more proof that verse is not inherently autobiographical.
I then got Quill, my ChatGPT, to produce the illustration from the first ten lines. It’s a good representation. So I then shared the whole poem with Quill, and got this response:
“The whole poem makes the circular structure clear: the vermilion pavilions are watered and spawned by Christ’s blood, so Christianity’s promised redemption continually regenerates the civilians waiting amid war. The return of the opening stanza is therefore much darker than mere repetition.
The illustration still works remarkably well. It depicts the first movement—the remote God decreeing continued war—and the immense field of red tents already carries the later implication of blood fertilising further suffering. If anything, its failure to show the Crucified is useful: the reader encounters that theological turn only when the poem provides it.
As an exercise in rhyme, it is audacious. The tiny rhyme reservoirs force the argument forward in incantatory bursts, while the awkwardly ingenious “caught by / those who fought at” and “if you sieve” advertise the experimental game without quite collapsing into comic verse. “Inconclusive, / Thought-inducive, / Why-elusive” is especially characteristic of an intelligent young poet testing how much argumentative weight an obsessive sound-pattern can bear.
And the poem is not straightforwardly devotional even before knowing your beliefs. “The gentlest face / The human race / Has ever looked upon” sounds reverent, but the structure implicates that consoling image in the mechanism by which bloodshed is sanctified and reproduced. The ending can be read as Christian affirmation—but also as a decidedly uneasy accusation. That ambiguity is probably why it remains interesting fifty years later.”
‘A Billion Civilians’ was first published, very recently, in Bewildering Stories #1152 – thanks, Don Webb!
Art by RHL and ChatGPT, aka Quill, working in GPT-6 Astra Light mode
I struggle with his life. In that warm land of his self-exiled end, a graveyard stone hushes his willfullness, but when the sand first mixed his ashes, didn’t London frown and sneer that the infidel would now command a truer view of God? And all I’ve read about his careless loving (women as things to take, enjoy, and jettison) has fed a crabbed dislike. But let the poems appear in their own strength—raging at old, mad kings, hymning the autumn, moaning black despair, packing in fourteen lines the whole decay of human tyrants’ pride—and they strip bare my morals: Wonder sweeps his sins away.
*****
Maryann Corbett writes: “What sparked this poem, quite simply, was an invitation from Ken Gordon of The Sonneteer to write a bouts-rimés with the end-rhymes of Ozymandias, in celebration of Shelley’s birthday. I fooled around with a subject unrelated to Shelley himself but decided that, given my instructions, the poem had to be about Shelley, so I’d have to do something with my conflicted feelings about the man.”
Maryann Corbett earned a doctorate in English from the University of Minnesota in 1981 and expected to be teaching Beowulf and Chaucer and the history of the English language. Instead, she spent almost thirty-five years working for the Office of the Revisor of Statutes of the Minnesota Legislature, helping attorneys to write in plain English and coordinating the creation of finding aids for the law. She returned to writing poetry after thirty years away from the craft in 2005 and is now the author of two chapbooks and six full-length collections, most recently The O in the Air (Franciscan U. Press, 2023). Her work has won the Willis Barnstone Translation Prize and the Richard Wilbur Award, has appeared in many journals on both sides of the Atlantic, and is included in anthologies like Measure for Measure: An Anthology of Poetic Meters and The Best American Poetry. A seventh book, Notifications from the Unseen, is forthcoming from Slant Books.
Illustration: Joseph Severn’s portrait of Percy Bysshe Shelley, in Wikimedia. The radical 19th century poet practiced the politics of the plate. For Shelley and other liberals of his day, keeping sugar out of tea was a political statement against slavery.
A rollerback and ballpoint, smartly standing inside the holder, flash their dignity. Illegible and lengthy roughwork, scrawled on sheets, hint at a poem still expanding or old stuff being polished thoroughly. Upon this cropland, labour’s never stalled.
Two well-stacked books of minstrels from the past refill this poet’s mental inventory when it’s devoid of stock. Some letters, furled and kept inside his drawer tell: he’s amassed a tonne of publications and the glory extended by the literary world.
Some white scrunched pages in the waste bin say discontent looms at times. The gooseneck lamp confesses how it stayed up with him through the nights bereft of words. What takes away such great distress? What remedy revamps his mind? Perhaps the ashtray gives a clue.
*****
‘A Poet’s Desk’ was originally published in Orbis.
Shamik Banerjee is a poet from Assam, India. He currently resides in Gurgaon, Haryana. Some of his recent publications include Spelt, Ink Sweat & Tears, St. Austin, San Antonio Review, Sheepshead Review, The Trinity Review, Third Wednesday, and Amethyst Review among others. He secured second position in the Southern Shakespeare Company Sonnet Contest, 2024, and was nominated for the Best of the Net by Flapper Press.
I’m tired of Love: I’m still more tired of Rhyme. But Money gives me pleasure all the time.
*****
Hilaire Belloc, the author most famously of ‘Cautionary Tales for Children‘ (including “Jim, who ran away from his nurse, and was eaten by a lion” and “Matilda, who told lies and was burned to death”) is always good for a deflationary mood.
No matter what you do, it doesn’t last: Your best endeavours are gone in an hour. If you could see the present become past, Your better weather just a passing shower, If you could see your garden run to weeds That once was hoed and tended with such care And understand you only bury seeds That will outlive us, and will still be there When we are gone, to sprout and live anew, Would you think that your labour is worth while To do the things you feel you have to do, To make the effort, go the extra mile? What else is there to do but push ahead? So damn them all and be glad you’ll be dead.
***** Bob Trewin writes: “This is my first poem in Snakeskin. I have previously appeared in some anthologies produced by the Holmfirth Writers’ Group (published by George Simmers, who is a founder member). I have also self-published two collections: Snowflakes in the Night, available from Amazon and the Lulu bookstore and Sonnets and Sundries, available from the Lulu bookstore.
“As for where this poem came from, I wonder how much you, living elsewhere, are aware of the rapid transformation that is happening in the UK, a transformation that no recent government has had a mandate to sanction, let alone actively pursue. If it is reversible, I will certainly not be around to witness it.”
Since scribbling some mediocre verse as a teenager, Bob Trewin put aside his pen for the best part of half a century. He began writing poetry again after retirement and now belongs to a number of groups scattered across the Pennines in West Yorkshire. He has won first and second prize in successive years in the National Association of Writers and Groups’ Open Poetry Competition.
“Jansen, you gotta wear gloves when you work on the grinder. You want hurt yourself?” And then Kaczmarek looked down at Frank’s left hand. He saw the scar before the boy could jerk his arm away. “It’s nothing. An accident is all, ya know?” He’d done it Sunday night. Sometimes the burning made you feel alright when you were getting lonely. He had meant to do it somewhere hidden, but it felt good, the old man noticing like he had. That’s probably how it was to have a dad— he’d hit your backside with a leather belt when you were a little shit, but he’d care if you were hurt. He’d even stroke your hair.
*****
Alex Rettie writes: “Protection” was first published in the Summer 2026 issue of Nimrod International, edited by Boris Dralyuk. It’s part of an as-yet unpublished manuscript called “The Triangles,” which follows the lives of two gay men (including Frank, the speaker of the poem) and a nun (the former teacher of one of the men).”
Alex Rettie is a Calgary poet who has been published in print and online journals in Canada, Australia, the UK and the US. He co-edits the online poetry journal Poems for Persons of Interest (https://pfpoi.blogspot.com/). You can find more of his work on Substack at https://poemsforpoi.substack.com/.
At six o’clock, I wake, And plod down to the kitchen table In time to greet the sun, And hear the news on cable But focus on my sugar flakes; I don’t watch it none.
At eight, I hit the tees— I’m done faster without a foursome— And watch the wheeling hawks— At times, the game is boresome— And leave the club at ten oh three, In time for business talks.
At three, I call my mom, Who asks keenly about my meetings; I don’t have much to say. She wants to know I’m eating; I tell her yes to keep her calm. We do this every day.
At six I disconnect And meet friends at my favorite diner And drink a single glass. At eight, in my recliner, I grab my clicker to select The way the time will pass.
By nine, I’m back in bed, My teeth brushed and my body showered. The bed is soft and deep, My screens unplugged, unpowered. The pillow yields beneath my head. At four, I fall asleep.
*****
Narcisse Tardif writes: “I watch some crime documentaries here and there, and I’m struck whenever the murderer or would-be murderer just seems like a normal person. I wanted to use my poem to explore what life could be like for a “normal-person” murderer who got away with it. OJ was a big inspiration, but the poem is not meant to just be a retelling of the OJ story.
“The form is an ad hoc invention. I liked the double stress of “plod down” because of its evocative nature, so I built the second line around that, using a trochaic substitution in the second foot of each second line. The rest of the form is meant to be somewhat conversational, mimicking the ebb and flow of daily life, with some variation here and there, but the repetition of the exact form in every stanza still leaves enough sameness to evoke routine. I don’t know whether you have a policy regarding overexplaining poems on your blog, but the line about drinking a single glass is supposed to be a hint, as well as the more obvious sleepless night. On a more subtle note, the complete absence of a romantic partner is a bit of subtext throughout the whole poem.”
Narcisse Tardif self-describes as “Poet grappling with the ironies and incongruities of heartbreak, religion, meditation, and mortality. I write mostly in English, but also in French and sometimes other languages. First person ≠ autobiographical.”
From worship and tenderness to profanity. Two poems becoming one through the contrapuntal technique.
Quatorzain I: Secrecy.
Solemn prayers fill the empty church; hallow’d songs arise from pews of birch.
Midnights are when angels fill the halls— neither flaw nor sin to weight their calls— right where Heaven’s ardent mercy falls. Yes, Amen, and God, they sing aloud, earnest praises proudly thus avowed, bless’d by secrecy’s embrace and shroud.
Only God may hear them. Only he knows the meaning of their cry and plea. Yet-unknown and his alone to see, choirs outbreathe a psalm when no one’s near as an offering at last sincere, echoed up in majesty and fear.
Quatorzain II: In Sacred Places.
Caressing, smiling, both confiding, enamored dreamers kiss in hiding. In sacred places coinciding, grotesque to Earth, they birth a treasure, humanity devoid of measure, melodic in its throes of pleasure.
Secure’s the love away from judges— revealed to none who touch begrudges, observes the bruising lips and smudges— liturgical in eyes’ occlusion. Neglect has borne them disillusion, religion out of shared seclusion.
Nocturnal lovers taste affection seduced by solitude. Perfection.
Contrapuntal: Secrecy in Sacred Places.
Solemn prayers fill the empty church; Caressing, smiling, both confiding, Hallow’d songs arise from pews of birch.
Enamored dreamers kiss in hiding. Midnights are when angels fill the halls— In sacred places coinciding,
Neither flaw nor sin to weight their calls— Grotesque to Earth, they birth a treasure, Right where Heaven’s ardent mercy falls.
Humanity devoid of measure, Yes, Amen, and God, they sing aloud, Melodic in its throes of pleasure.
Earnest praises proudly thus avowed, Sincere’s the love away from judges— Bless’d by secrecy’s embrace and shroud.
Revealed to none who touch begrudges, Only God may hear them. Only he Observes the birth of bruising smudges—
Knows the meaning of their cry and plea. Liturgical within seclusion. Yet-unknown and his alone to see,
Neglect has borne them disillusion— Choirs outbreathe a psalm when no one’s near Religion out of shared seclusion.
Asan offering at last sincere, Nocturnal lovers taste affection, Echoed up in majesty and fear. ’ Seduced by solitude. Perfection.
*****
Brooklyn Crane writes:
This God-Forsaken Contrapuntal!
Contrapuntal poetry seems complicated, and it actually is. Merging lines and meanings can be quite tricky! However, I’ve read several of them either composed of poems which barely hold up on their own or too short enough to be manageable, and in response to this, I obviously went over the top. Let’s see everything you can do by blending two poems together!
A contrapuntal text is the result of the intercalary arrangement of two separate pieces of writing which creates a hidden meaning.
When I prepared to pitch the idea of writing a complex-as-all-hell contrapuntal to my friend and fellow writer Narcisse Tardif, the very first thought that came to mind was that of how most contrapuntal poetry out there simply isn’t formal at all. I mean, who has the time for that? Of course, this being my publication, the name of which is Scheming Rhymes, I naturally had to do something about that. Two questions came out of this train of thought, and these were:
What if it was a contrapuntal between two sonnets?
What if I could produce an acrostic resulting from their intercalation?
If you’ve actually read my poem, you will obviously notice that the sonnets are not sonnets at all—or at least not in the traditional sense of the word. They are indeed quatorzains, as the silly French call the 14-line arrangements that most sonnets adhere to, but the only thing these have in common with them is the couplet of the Shakespearean variant. Undeniably, I could have just written two sonnets. However, it’s never that simple on Scheming Rhymes, and you’re here for it. We’ll get there in a bit.
Regarding the acrostic, yes—there’s a reason for the italicized start of every line. Why did I do this? I just wanted to leave a signature in this poem. Here it is!
Fourteen and fourteen from each poem constituting this contrapuntal add up to twenty-eight lines for me to work with. Scheming Rhymes perfectly fills half of that space while Brooklyn Crane sadly leaves me one letter short. Upon this ill-fated realization, I added the S at the end and pretended myself to be a brilliant strategist who can overcome anything with enough delusion. Surely the reader will know that an apostrophe precedes itbecause, you know, the poem is mine.
It is now that we can address the odd rhyme schemes of the quatorzains as, with the previous information in mind, I went ballistic.
“Could I arrange the poems in a way that their merging results in a different form? If so, which form would that be?”
SO! Because I had just recently posted my terza rima composition breakdown, it was freshly in my mind that a possible solution to this conundrum was such a form. I mean, think about it. Terza rima poems work on a formula of 3x + 1 (or 2), so I did 28 minus 1, divided by 3, and I landed on– I KNOW YOU ARE NOT HERE FOR THE MATH! Anyway, I landed on 9 tercets plus 1 loose line, accounting for all twenty-eight verses.
Next was the question of what the rhyme schemes had to be in order to fulfill this crazy dream. Terza rima works on a ABA BCB CDC … YZY Z (or ZZ) scheme, so I superimposed it on the acrostic as follows.
I hope that you are starting to see the way these two bastards came into existence. We now have the structural guidelines for both quatorzains and the resulting terza rima. This would absolutely be enough for a sane person to go about their day. It’s a double quatorzain/terza rima/contrapuntal/acrostic after all.
It was not enough for me, but I will not bore you with the metrical choices made in this poem. It’s explained on the paid-for section of my terza rima post, though.
Oh, yes. This is a shameless plug for my paid subscription. Come on—you already love Scheming Rhymes!
With all of these guardrails to work with, it was finally time to write. It was absolute hell.
But why do this?
The short answer is: because I can, lol. The actual answer, however, is that I do it because it can be done. Scheming Rhymes is all about exploring what we can do to enrich poetry, understanding both the traditions that educate our verse today and the techniques that might innovate its composition tomorrow. This work is not perfect, I’m aware, and there is sure to be someone who executes the planning behind it more expertly, but we ought to encourage writers to challenge themselves and produce beauty through effort, not through simply making poetry easier.
So there you have it. Here’s to more brutal antitheses to free verse poetic prose!
Join the madness—or don’t!
As with all previously explored forms and techniques, I am not here to police you about how you write and what decisions you make. You can make lines vary in syllable count, ditch the rhymes, change the number of lines per stanza, or anything else you want to do. All I intend on this publication is to give you a starting point from which to find your identity as a writer. Here’s the text by Ani Beeler that inspired me to explore this technique using a completely different approach:
Brooklyn Crane: Celebrating human ingenuity in poetry! Writer, advocate, unapologetic rhyme addict, and public enemy of AI content. Subscribe to Scheming Rhymes—read more of my work and learn more about poetry forms and techniques.
Illustration attributed to Mihály Zichy based on Mikhail Lermontov’s poem The Demon, via Art Renewal Center.
What hovers above condenses below And the vagus nerve has wonders to show: Mill of the belly, invisible grind Slick convolutions sculpt all they find Smooth muscle contracts around traveling scat As sensual as the yawn of a cat. An abdominal chorus—how it gurgles! Saturn’s own voice, corruptly fertile. Cells split and shimmy, chromosomes boil Identity settles, signed with a coil,
Written in meat’s salty alphabet. Pulsing skin shimmers, scented and wet. Eyeballs disguised writhe over a dream. Our rubbery hearts, the genitals’ steam Carbon dioxide’s vegetable tang Ancient green song all vertebrates sang Wet from the lick of valence’s tongue. Leaping or lurching down star light’s descent Trailing our dreams and our excrement. From acids and stink the soul forges land: Thoughts in our heads, and work in the hand.
*****
Elizabeth Hurst writes: “Below” was inspired by the concentration of nerves in our guts that functions as a second brain, the alchemical axiom “As above, so below” & “Love has pitched his mansion in the place of excrement” from Yeats’s Crazy Jane poem.”
Elizabeth Hurst is originally from Los Angeles and moved up to San Francisco many years ago. She lives out by the beach with her husband, Gerald Stack.
“The strong survive, and all of that,” he’d tell the limply dangling cloth between his beak, a former moth, but doesn’t sense the lunging cat,
who doesn’t think the wheels that run consider cats their proper prey. Yet, now he’s just a dead display beneath the slowly dying sun.
Who knows if later down the road that truck won’t strike a rotting tree and bring to bear on top of me its paralyzing wooden load?
Though like a reel of comic scenes, it’s also how our stories go: the endings are the same, we know, but brought about by varied means.
*****
Paul Burgess writes: “Earlier in the summer, a bird appeared in front of me casually holding a dying moth and looking almost cheerful. The encounter got me thinking about deaths that come suddenly, without malice, and without much meaning to the creatures or things that have caused them. I can’t say exactly why, but some combination of my mood and the circumstances made the sight more vivid and significant to me than it might have been on another day.”
‘Another Old, Familiar Story’ was first published in Snakeskin.
Paul Burgess is the sole proprietor of a business in Lexington, Kentucky that offers ESL classes in addition to English, Japanese, and Spanish-language translation and interpretation services. He has recently contributed work to The Road Not Taken, Blue Unicorn, Light, The Orchards, Pulsebeat, Snakeskin, Lighten Up Online, and several other publications. https://paulburgesswritingandlanguage.blog/
Form in Formless Times 