The American Sentence with a twist
A bit of a poetry exercise
The American Sentence is a poem with seventeen syllables in a single line. Poet Allen Ginsberg seemed to have issues with haiku style poems and felt a seventeen-syllable sentence was more ‘merican. For a more in-depth explanation of the American Sentence and some of Ginsberg’s examples, look here.
Over at Honeygloom’s substack, there is a page for the Horror Haiku Club. This is a fun exercise and I’ll be keeping my eye out for more. I say all that to say I’m totally stealing this idea and making an American Sentence version for some sci/fi shenanigans, though I reserve the right to go where I please with it.
What are the rules? Use seventeen syllables in a single sentence. Of course, being American in origin, this version of poetry often breaks its own rules. If you use more than one sentence, who cares? Even Ginsberg used settings and timestamps before or after his sentences. Just stick to the magic number of seventeen and get your theme, feeling, point across to the reader.
Without further ado…
Your prompt is Orc Noir.
Down these fae streets an orc must go, fit for adventure or vendetta.
Share your sentence in the comments!
Small, fierce and loyal, an orc dachshund accompanies his master home.
He found her dog.
Then he found her body.
Someone was going to pay.