verse in honour of Dr. JJ, whose love of life included comedy and the music of poetry ...
In this post, we continue with a novel form of poetic wordplay. Inspired by Japanese haiku poetry, this new form is used for a terse verse with a total of 17 syllables displayed on three lines. Unlike its classic Japanese analogue, this concoction does not mandate the precise distribution of the syllables among the three lines, but does stipulate that each word in the poem be included in a palindromic phrase or sentence in English (i.e. one that can be read either forwards or backwards). Some of the palindromes exploited here are found in the classic repertoire of such wordplay, part are variants on these classics, and a part derive entirely from the distorted mental processes of the authors.
To help the reader discern the origin of the lyrics, each palindrome (generally occupying one of the three lines of the poem) has been color-coded.
palinku |
palinku |