I have a near-final draft of “To a Swallow”! I can scarce believe it; it seemed to me this day would never come!
Compositional Quandaries
For the sake of symmetry, I am considering sacrificing the final verse from the “To a Swallow” draft. I may yet do so—once I assemble the selected variations into a poem and see the effect of the imbalance—but for now, it remains.
The poem has a traditional rhyming scheme: ABAB CDCD EFEF GHGH IJIJ. The asymmetry is created by lines 12 (F2) and 16 (H2) that follow a similar pattern (the repetition of a word set; for example, “Da-dum! Da-dum! Da-dum!”)—an element I want to keep.
I must, therefore, either embrace the “imbalance” for the sake of evocation in lines 12 and 16 or rethink the poem structure (which strikes me as ridiculous) to satisfy my aesthetic inclinations.
In most disciplines in life, the better you become, the easier the work. It is not so in art.
