Rubai of Light

The moon is a balloon that fills the night
which bursts with stars and constellations bright,
reminding late night lovers of the dawn
whose fingers shatter dreams with early light.

Kim M. Russell, 2018

Image result for The moon is a balloon that fills the night which bursts with stars and constellations bright, reminding late night lovers of the dawn whose fingers shatter dreams with early light.
Image found on Pinterest

My response to dVerse Poets Pub Meeting the Bar: Variations on the Rubaiyat

This week our host for Meeting the Bar is Frank with a challenge that involves the Rubaiyat: he would like us to write a poem that uses the rubai stanza form as inspiration, if not imitation of the form.

Frank tells us that a rubai, or stanza in a rubaiyat, is four lines long and rhymes AABA with iambic pentameter, which is how Edward Fitzgerald translated the Rubaiyat by 11th century Persian Omar Khayyam, of which the translation appeared in 1859.

Frank’s challenge is to use the rubai as inspiration and create our own variation, which may be very close to Fitzgerald’s four iambic pentameter lines rhyming AABA, or it might be surprisingly different. The only requirement is to have more than one stanza.

Frank has also given us a guiding theme, if we need one, and asks us to consider this famous poem from Khayyam’s Rubaiyat:

Here with a Loaf of Bread beneath the Bough,
A Flask of Wine, a Book of Verse–and Thou
Beside me singing in the Wilderness–
And Wilderness is Paradise enow.

25 thoughts on “Rubai of Light”

  9. Oh my, Kim. What a wonderful response to the prompt. Love the title. Love the image. And love all the imagery and description different aspects of light here. That word “shatter” does indeed shatter the dream…and the serenity.

    Liked by 1 person

    Reply

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