Happy Valentine's Day!

For the day's sake, we will take a reprive from standard writing a do some POETRY today in the form of a sonnet, named by many as THE supreme form of romantic writing.  Of course, today is not all about romance, but it's about caring for and loving all individuals in our lives, whether the be strangers, acquaintances, friends, or family. You will have the chance to try your hand at that great form of writing, aka the Shakespearean Sonnet! First,w hat does it look like? Read the poem below:


EXAMPLE:

Shakespeare Sonnet 18
"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?"
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
   Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
   And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
   And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
   By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
   Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade,
   When in eternal lines to time thou growest;
So long as men can breathe, or eyes can see,
   So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

And one that's a bit more ironical (my lady is great but I'm not going to lie and say she outshines everyone else in beauty, but hey, that doesn't mean I can't love her all the same!):

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; 
Coral is far more red than her lips' red;
If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; 
If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. 
I have seen roses damask'd, red and white, 
But no such roses see I in her cheeks;
And in some perfumes is there more delight 
Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.
I love to hear her speak, yet well I know
 That music hath a far more pleasing sound;
I grant I never saw a goddess go; 
My mistress, when she walks, treads on the ground.
And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare 
As any she belied with false compare.

What You Do:

1.  If you look carefully at the sonnet above, you should see that the sonnet follows the following rhyme scheme: a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d, e-f-e-f, g-g
2. Also,t here are 10 syllables in each line (10). The meter, or rhythmic structure, follows a short-long rhythm (i.e. "Da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM"). The particular meter is called "iambic pentameter." It is the most common meter in English poetry.
3. Now it's time to get writing! Using the knowledge about the sonnet that you’ve gained, you should try and put together a 14-line poem that fits the rhyme scheme and meter of Shakespeare's sonnet. This won't be easy, but it doesn't have to be a chore, either. It might help to make this a silly exercise instead of a full-blown love poem.
4. When you are finished, read over the poem together to make sure that the rhyme scheme and meter have been adhered to. If you want, you can copy her poem into a Valentine's card and give it to someone special!