Ulysses On Ithaca

Yestersay, I discovered a new poetic form that I hadn't really come across before--the villanelle. It's a form not much used in English (coming originally from France) though Dylan Thomas used it to good effect in his famous poem about his father, "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night". Basically, the form has 5 triplets and a final quattrain. Only 2 rhymes are used throughout. I tried my hand at the form and came up with the following.




Why do you love me still and speak my name
After the many failures which we knew?
Why do you care for me and yet remain?

You are the one who always played the lover’s game
With just a “pizzico” of something new:
Why do you love me still and speak my name?

I don’t believe our love’s remained the same.
In Mantova a strange indifference grew.
Why do you care for me and yet remain?

I wouldn’t want to try and lay the blame
For everything I lost, on loving you.
Why do you love me still and speak my name?

I know you never wanted to complain
About the ways in which I wasn’t true:
Why do you care for me and yet remain?

How much you like to play the archer’s game!
(Or is it that you know I still love you?)
Why do you love me still and speak my name?
Why do you care for me and yet remain?

For the rest of this day, I'll be correcting scripts at the university where I work. :(