Nevada Sonnet

A Nevada Sonnet is merely a Fourteener with required, consistent internal rhyme occurring at the same syllable in each line.  The idea is to keep the Alexandrine meter from falling apart under its own weight.  This is all about making the sonnet a more cohesive unit.

Metrics: 14 lines written in Iambic heptameter

Rhyme Pattern:  Any sonnet pattern known to man, including blank verse.

Defining characteristic:  An internal rhyme pair in consistent position on each line.

Volta neither required nor prohibited.

Example Poem:

I've Killed   (Nevada Sonnet)

An atheist, an agnostic, a Christian and a fool,

I've been deist, and quite caustic toward what I've  deemed fraud.

I've been a lout who wielded clout, a bureaucrat, a tool,

an entrepreneur, full of manure, and… some things to laud.

I've killed, and not in war.  For that my soul is sore.  The rest

I can amend or change my friend, but that's indelible.

I killed what meant most to me.  His ghost I see- on rare nights.

Mercy killing, though culture willing, is not correctable.

I killed my dying pup.  Defying reason, conscience stings.

I was too small then to quell all life with one mighty blow.

I had to hit ,and cry and hit, hit again.  Of all things

I've ever done, that is the one that haunts.  Empathy so

flows to dogs that all my life, says my wife, I've felt more pain

for them then men.  That may be so until we meet again.

© Larry Eberhart, aka, Lawrencealot

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