Unfamiliar Genre: Cinquain
Cinquain is a French word with a root of “cinq” which means “five” – the amount of lines in a Cinquain poem. A Cinquain is a five-line poem. However, it is an American poetry form. Its founder, Adelaide Crapsey, was influenced by Japanese haiku poetry, and developed this poetic for to communicate brief thoughts and statements (Kenn, 2011).
The words you choose and the form they take on paper are an important part of the writing. Some people say they appear like diamonds on paper (Kenn, 2011).
Here’s an example of a Cinquain poem
Spaghetti
Messy, spicy
Slurping, sliding, falling
Between my plate and mouth
Delicious
(Barden)
The reason I chose cinquains is that, whereas they are just five lines long, with only a few words on each line, making them easy to write for many, for me, this has proved to be hard, and I have eventually never tried writing any,
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only reading them is what I have found to be interesting. For instance, the first and last lines have just two syllables, while the middle lines have more, so they end up with a diamond-like shape, similar to the poetic form called the diamante. That to me sounds like some, “24682 code”. Too difficult for me to remember and even attempt writing - just reading it. Cinquain has no specific audience. It is just meant or its purpose is to describe something or tell a story, and designed to entertain or inform. While writing it, the poet needs to keep in mind that each line has a certain amount of words and certain descriptive/types of words This is how a cinquain can be used to tell a story: start with your subject on the first line, describe it on the second, put an action on the third line, a feeling on the fourth line, and a conclusion on the last line. Cinquain is heavily influenced and inspired by the Japanese Haiku which, is a poem based on the seventeen-syllable three-line poems of the ancient Japanese; and may employ literary techniques and be judged by literary standards. Haiku are meant to stir emotion and stimulate reflection in the reader through simple precise objective depictions of things in nature. Just like haikus, cinquains can be said, to recited or told to the audience to enable people in the audience share moments of their lives and experiences over time. They are mostly on personal experience. For instance, writing a cinquain about one’s favorite ice cream. On word choice, sentence fluency, visual layout, and choice fonts, cinquain does not present any special feature, or rhetorical strategies.
However, it is generally required that the poem is centered. This, to me, means that, where it is not centered on the page, then it ceases to be a cinquain.
Cinquain has the following four basic rules that must be observed when one needs to write it the traditional way; first, he or she needs to keep in mind the general format that, Cinquains are five lines long; secondly, that cinquains have 2 syllables in the first line, 4 in the second, 6 in the third, 8 in the fourth line, and only 2 in the last line; and, lastly, that, cinquains do not necessary need to have rhyme scheme, but one can include rhymes if he or she wants to.
Cinquian seems to employee three strategies that make it successful. The first, strategy is on how to “get started”. At this stage, the writer or poet has to select a topic. The poet needs to choose something to write about, especially on an idea: for instance, his favorite thing; what he hates; or what even what happen to
him. For instance, if one loves “Soccer”, then his first line, would be “My Soccer”. Second strategy is that, after selecting what to write about, the poet or writer needs to brainstorm over his subject, idea or topic. He can think of as many things as he can and write them down on a piece of paper. After writing all his ideas down, for them to turn into a cinquain poem, he needs to say or put them in a way that he has five lines with the right number of syllables on each line Finally, the last strategy is counting the Syllables. It is recommended that he counts his syllables with his fingers as he write each line. Where a line has too many syllables or not enough syllables, he can change some of the words to get the right number of syllables. Once it is done, he should, read it again, counting the syllables on his fingers to make sure he got everything right. The poem should, however, say what he wanted, even after the syllables count is correct. He can do this by reading and making necessary changes. Cinquain seems to sound easier, but the rules and strategies employed make it even harder to write, for a beginner like me. I think it requires a lot of practice and guidance from a person who has experience in writing it.
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tells us a story and has a regular rhyme scheme, it is a narrative and
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It was written in the classical style with the 5-7-5. 5 syllables in the first line, 7 in the middle, and 5 again in the final line. It is also present tense which stays with the traditional haiku form. I took inspiration from Inada and “Listening Images”. I knew that I wanted this poem to be personal. I used a question in the last line to help establish that. I took the idea of asking the reader a question from the Miles Davis portion of “Listening Images” “3 valves, tubing.../ How many feelings?” I really drew from how Inada used so few words but conveyed so much. I knew that this was also something I needed in my haiku. The words that I choose are very important, especially in this form. The power of the words used is everything. Inadas use isn’t quite as personal as how I used the question, but I always found this particular part of “Listening Images” to be the most