Last week, David Lehman introduced the fateful Antigone as our muse for an acrostic poem styled after her name. There were many wonderful takes on the prompt, from Greek etymologies (titrate, expiklarate, and peripetaea) to effective anagrams ("one" and "gone," for example) to the resounding art of brevity. There are a dozen crafty and clever candidates, all of which contribute to a rich discussion, not only of the classics, but of all the things that make tragedy so beautiful, and something to learn from.
Here is the winning acrostic, by Christine Rhein:
As in any one heart, compelled,
Not by duty, but by grief,
To defy a hateful law, its tonnage.
Imagine being locked away.
Gone for good, the saying goes.
Oh, giant nation, the Thou-Shalt-
Nots all knotted, the anti-anti-lies,
Every tone, atonement tolling.
For next week, we will be drawing inspiration from lifted lines. They are as follows:
(1) “I’m going to break that marriage up”—Teresa Wright
in The Best Years of our Lives
(2) “I’ll have what she’s having”—spoken by director Rob
Reiner’s mother in When Harry Met Sally in Katz’s Deli (NYC)
(3) “How the hell do I know why there were Nazis? I don’t
know how the can opener works.”—from Hannah and Her Sisters
Visit the American Scholar's page to read the full post, and to enter your candidate for next week!
-- Virginia Valenzuela
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