We Dance To Different Drums

The rules are there they say – you behave
exactly in the way you want to compliment
the manner you are treated. What you give
you get in due respect and nothing more
is needed. Obey the rules and life’s assured
a great success. Except it doesn’t work both
ways –no villanelle that plays with 19 lines
and ends in a quatrain. The sonnet form will
give you less but freedom to digress and vie
in foreign frames of reference. And when you
build relationships with strong iambic beat
and set pentameter refrain to fix your feet
be sure to count the lines and not the steps
you take to meet on common ground. There
in the confluence of greeting lies the seed to
your success, it’s not within the rules you’ve
dressed nor in the rhythmic mind – we dance
to rhythms beat in every innocence, but not
in simple sum to the cadence of a single drum.
© 15 March 2007, I.D. Carswell