Sestinas (Part 1), by Sandra Beasley

Sestina: six six-line stanzas that use a common set of endwords, culminating in a tercet incorporating those same six endwords, with the endwords appearing in a prescribed order. 

Sestina: a 12th-century form invented the the troubadours, particularly Provençal poet Arnaut Daniel. A form whose acrobatics declare Look at me. If I weren't a Real Poet--worthy of patronage--could I write this?

Sestina: jigsaw puzzle. Obsession. Bee in the bonnet. Bugaboo.

I first came to the sestina form in college, at the order of an advanced seminar that cycled us through every major poetic form. Faced with that Soduku-like pattern of endwords, I did what any undergraduate would do. I cheated. Using found language from a newspaper article, completely ignoring rhythm and line length, enjambing like a madwoman, I jiggered that poem into existence with chewing gum and duct-tape. 

A few years later, I would come to the form again thanks to poet Henry Taylor, my mentor while in the MFA program at American University. If I didn't respect the sestina (yet), well, hell, I respected Henry. He refused to read sestinas that were anything other than iambic pentameter. He made me slow down and respect a form that is more self-conscious of its repetition than any other, except perhaps the villanelle; and, unlike the villanelle, cannot be sustained by grief alone.

I like sestinas because of the challenge. I like them because their guaranteed length forces me to give myself permission to unfold a narrative that I might not make time for otherwise: the rant of a cranky mother platypus, or the regrets of the first editor of Encyclopedia Britannica. I like that it's possible to "know" the oeuvre of published sestinas, because of their inherent complexity and rarity, in a way that's difficult with any other form. 

As someone who has written a few sestinas--perhaps not masterful ones, but a few--I thought I would share one of the canonical ones of the genre, and point out a few aspects from a crafts-woman's point of view. So without further ado, Elizabeth Bishop's "Sestina":

SESTINA

September rain falls on the house.

In the failing light, the old grandmother

sits in the kitchen with the child

beside the Little Marvel Stove,

reading the jokes from the almanac,

laughing and talking to hide her tears.

She thinks that her equinoctial tears

and the rain that beats on the roof of the house 

were both foretold by the almanac,

but only known to a grandmother.

The iron kettle sings on the stove.

She cuts some bread and says to the child,

It's time for tea now; but the child

is watching the teakettle's small hard tears

dance like mad on the hot black stove,

the way the rain must dance on the house.

Tidying up, the old grandmother

hangs up the clever almanac

on its string. Birdlike, the almanac

hovers half open above the child,

hovers above the old grandmother

and her teacup full of dark brown tears.

She shivers and says she thinks the house

feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove.

It was to be, says the Marvel Stove.

I know what I know, says the almanac.

With crayons the child draws a rigid house

and a winding pathway. Then the child

puts in a man with buttons like tears

and shows it proudly to the grandmother.

But secretly, while the grandmother

busies herself about the stove,

the little moons fall down like tears

from between the pages of the almanac

into the flower bed the child

has carefully placed in the front of the house.

Time to plant tears, says the almanac.

The grandmother sings to the marvelous stove

and the child draws another inscrutable house.

-Elizabeth Bishop

There's so many things that could be said about this poem. But rather than untangle the poem's psychological tapestry, I'd like to draw attention to a quintet of qualities; the reasons why, as a fellow wrangler with the form, I say yes.

Honoring the form, #1: Note that each line is four or five stressed beats, and (usually) nine to eleven syllables. Henry would be proud. This isn't needless pedantry; a regular line adds structure to the sestina that resists the form's avalanching momentum. (Really, this word again? Again? Again again again?)

Honoring the form, #2: These are not cheatin' endwords. These are tough, un-malleable endwords. House could be stretched as a noun or a verb, but almanac? Stove? No "that" or "the," no "I"/"eye." 

Honoring the form, #3: Notice how efficiently the poem moves through a meaningful narrative moment in these endtopped lines--"She shivers and says she thinks the house / feels chilly, and puts more wood in the stove." I wish more sestina-ers let things happen in their poems. 

Honoring the form, #4: Most practitioners will admit that you get really sick of your endwords around stanza four. If you make it through, the trick is to then change direction, much like a sonnet's volta. So what does Bishop do? Direct address. "It was to be, says the Marvel Stove." Suddenly, a passive vehicle becomes active. We are newly intrigued. 

Honoring the form, #5: Envois are tough. Your endwords are compressed. Words you had carefully managed to make sense in the previous six stanzas may suddenly seem like nonsense. If you fall in love with a phrasing that requires a strategic reversal of endword order, well, good luck working back up the braid to re-order throughout.

What is so smart about Bishop's choice of endwords is that, at the end, she has three active subjects--the child, the grandmother, and (by now) the almanac. Her envoi has a physical thrust; again, things happen. She has set it up so that things can happen. 

No wonder she had chutzpah to call it "Sestina." Oh, Miss Bishop, Miss Bishop!

Comments

[Samuel Peralta]

I love your piece, beautifully done! (And love the platypus poem too!) I love the form, I have written many sestinas, and unfortunately tore all of them up. Not a single one remains because I've never been happy with mine. Sonnets I can do with my eyes closed, but for some reason sestinas have defeated me.

Case in point: Here's a recent attempt 'The Time Traveller's Sestina', that turned into a 'The Time Traveller's Sonnet' - http://bit.ly/s4timetravel - Grrr!

Some day, some day...

[Jilly]

I loooovvvve sestinas.

[Sandra Beasley]

Jilly, I love sestinas too! We should develop a secret handshake to signify our affections.

Sam, thanks for the comments. I think you're on to something with the resonance between sestinas and sonnets. I think the need for a sestina to shift after the fourth stanza is very similar to a sonnet's volta between the first eight and the final six lines. And in Elizabethan sonnets, the closing couplet often uses the same compression techniques as an envoi.

Don't beat yourself up. A good sonnet's a lot better end result than a half-assed sestina! I know, having written a LOT of half-asses sestinas.

[Sara Diane Doyle]

The sestina is one of my very favorite forms, though I have never heard of imposing a strict meter on it (that would make me sad as I am very very bad at meter!). When I was first learning about them, a poet friend told me that nouns were required for the end words (which I know now is not true) but I tend to pick nouns because it anchors the poem nicely. I like to research my nouns (yes, I always pick the words before I write the poem, seems to work well that way for me), and I end up having very fun poems that take on deep flavor. I've also found proper nouns are fantastic--I've used Istanbul and Katmandu (and with the research, the whole poem becomes like a history lesson!). Thanks for writing about this lovely form!