Next Line, Please: A Bold Caravan Departs [by Virginia Valenzuela]

In last week's post of Next Line, Please, contributor's were asked to write an abecedarian poem in 26 words that would recount the plot of a particular novel, book, or play. We thought this one might be challenging, but the Next Line, Please contributors filled the poetry caravan with enticingly good recapitulations.

Diana Ferraro’s “Hamlet” tells us a little something about betrayal, violence, and the essence of truth:

Ardent betrayal casts dice!
Elsinore fights ghosts!
Hamlet is jinxed.
Kingdom, law, mother,
new occurrences
pose questions, raise subjects.
Truth unearths violent wisdom.
Xyphoid yarn zips

Elizabeth Solsburg’s “Garden of Eden” yields such gems as “devil’s ethereal food” and “repitilian slithering”:

Adam becomes concerned—
devil’s ethereal food grows
here—its jaded
knowledge like memory.
Night opens pretended quiet,
reptilian slithering—
turbulence unimpeded.
Victorious wickedness.
Expelled, yearning.
Zero

Donald LaBranche chose an interesting and unexpected book to summarize: Varina by Charles Frazier. It concerns Varina Davis, the wife of Jefferson Davis, president of the Confederacy:

A book concerning defeat.
Every foray grows hell-bound.
Irascible justice kills legends
marching nightly
overcoming persistence.
Quirky road signs tragically
undergird Varina’s waxing xeric—
yesteryear’s zeitgeist.

And finally, a cento created by our own David Lehman to illustrate the many exceptional lines created for this week's prompt:

Absent belief, —Patricia Smith
As before, —George Collodi
Adam becomes concerned. —Elizabeth Solsburg
Abel: Buried; —Keith Barrett
Cain: Detained. —Keith Barrett

Anne beheaded! – —Millicent Caliban
cockney dream —Angela Ball
devours elephant —Charise Hoge
emancipating friends —Michael C. Rush
for grown-ups — —Charise Hoge
hat inferred —Charise Hoge
ghost, gentlemen, graves. —Ferraro; Caliban; Joyce

Hamlet is jinxed. —Diana Ferraro

Jesus! Krapp’s —Keith Barrett
Jumbo knockout. —Christine Rhein

Keys lend meaning. —Pamela Joyce
Matrimonial negotiations —Millicent Caliban
openly pursue —Michael C. Rush
quest requiring serious thought, —Pamela Joyce
rose-fingered skies. —Bryan Johnson
Quest realized: —LB
reptilian slithering. —Elizabeth Solsburg

Opaque
Party people
Quicken
Results. —Stephanie Cohen

Reality —Michael C. Rush
slams the unctuous, viscous wallop, —LB
seeks triumphant union —Millicent Caliban
underground. Violins wail: —Steve Belin-Oka
Vixen-vengeance: —Christine Rhein
victorious wickedness: —Elizabeth Solsburg
vaulting whiteness. —Bryan Johnson
Weltanschauung —Angela Ball
extinguishing yahoo zealots. —Michael C. Rush

Yaqui zen. —Michael C. Rush
Youthful zest. —Millicent Caliban
Yesteryear’s zeitgeist. —Donald LaBranche
Yearning’s zenith. —David Lehman.

For more abecedarians check out this post from December, and visit the American Scholar's page to read the whole post from last week!