Sestina Exercise
Each stanza of a sestina is 6 lines long. Each of these 6 lines ends in one of 6 words you choose. The table below will show you which words should end which line.
The final 3 lines of the poem are an "envoy". Each line of this stanza uses two words, again, in a specific order.
Traditionally, I believe these lines were supposed to be in a particular meter, but for the purposes of a creativity party, that makes it too complicated, so anything goes.
Here's what you do to play the Sestina game:
- Have everyone write down 6 nouns they would use in a poem on 6 separate slips of paper.
- Throw all of the nouns into a hat.
- Have everyone draw 6 nouns from the hat. This way, no one should wind up with all of the nouns they wrote (although it's statistically possible. Just not very likely.)
- If you wish, fill in a chart like the one below so you know which nouns should go where. People can order the nouns any way they want for the first stanza, but after that they have to follow the order.
- Write the sestina. Allow 1/2 to 3/4 hour for this exercise.
The table:
| Stanza 1 | Stanza 2 | Stanza 3 | Stanza 4 | Stanza 5 | Stanza 6 | Envoy | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 1. | 6. | 3. | 5. | 4. | 2. | 2. | 5. |
| 2. | 1. | 6. | 3. | 5. | 4. | 4. | 3. |
| 3. | 5. | 4. | 2. | 1. | 6. | 6. | 1. |
| 4. | 2. | 1. | 6. | 3. | 5. | none | none |
| 5. | 4. | 2. | 1. | 6. | 3. | none | none |
| 6. | 3. | 5. | 4. | 2. | 1. | none | none |
An example:
This is the sestina I wrote at my first creativity party:
(I've put the words I got in bold so they're easier to see.) I cannot shake this boredom.
Coming at the same time as the heat, it cannot be coincidence.
I feel as though the sun
Has dried my energy. The water
That was my thoughts has dried up, flown - perhaps to Paris
Naples, Moscow, or some other exotic place, but I can only sit here in my kitchen.
I hear you ask - Why my kitchen?
I cannot move, in my boredom.
Except in imagination, to "gay Par-ee."
Where I sit, drinking, by coincidence
My imagination that flew here in form of water.
Trying, just trying, to stay out of the sun.
I sit in shade, so no sun
Can find me. From the café's kitchen
I hear the sound of running water.
I leave behind my boredom
And watch those around me marvel at coincidence:
"Fancy meeting you here in Paris"
I've always wanted to travel to Paris
To wander old streets, see the sun
Rise over the Champs D'Elysee, which, by some coincidence
Is the view from my café. The kitchen
Door is opening, out comes a waitress, full of boredom
Who gives me a croissant and refills my glass of water.
The tinkling of the ice in the water
The Sights, sounds, smells of Paris
All could shake me from my boredom
If only I were really there. But I sit in the sun
In a too-hot kitchen,
And wonder if it is by coincidence
That I hear a Parisian accent outside my window? Coincidence
That my glass is now full of water,
Or coincidence that a croissant sits, lonely on my kitchen
Table? Aaah, I dreamed of Paris
An hallucination born of too much sun
And too much boredom.
If only coincidence could take me to Paris!
Then I'd drink water and eat croissants, and forget the sun!
I could leave my kitchen, and forget my boredom.
***