A Village Of Box (poem – cento)

by Stephen J Frankenberry

So Tuesday’s dVerse Poets prompt, “April Poems Bring May Centos”, was of two possibilities. Choose any line from any poem from those provided and write a poem including the line or inspired by it or, you could instead, try your hand at a “cento” (a poetic work wholly composed of verses or passages taken from other authors) also from any of the poems provided and to use at least two. In this case those poems provided for both were from April dVerse poetry prompts.

There were selections of poems from six different prompts and I went with the ones for “A Box Of Poems”, a prompt summarized as “write a poem of your own metaphorical box of 3 stanzas, the box, what’s in it, where’s it kept”. Then I decided to take the “Cento” route with this prompt as I had never done such.

7 poems and one of mine, also of a box, that used the prompt for inspiration but strayed from the particulars and went a different way.

So, the poems used for this Cento then . . .

Hidden In My Box – Bjorn Rudberg

History Box – Kim M. Russell

I Have Emptied You To The Wind – Paul Vincent Cannon

Empty Cereal Box – Melissa Lemay

Here Is A Box – Dora A.K.

My Master – Ben Alexander

Boxed – Punam – paeansunplugged

Cigar Box – Frankenberry

.

A Village of Box

The boxes are piling up

.

I made my box from stone

My box is made of cardboard

An empty cereal box

My box is forged of carbon steel

Made by human hands this box is

“Boxed” – I carry a bit of this and a bit of that

Here is a box (I won’t bore you)

Look-see, look-see (no you can’t see)

.

Inside it’s worn bent frame are crumbs and sugar dust

I filled it with dreams, ambitions of verses, ideals enshrined

Pale blue adorned with simple flowers

Pieces of a life,

Old photos, childhood toys,

Books strewn about

Images in sepia, monochrome and colour,

Higgedly-piggedly, no order

A repository of various thingamajigs

Disintegrating petal of pressed petunia

A bit of cloth, a coat of arms, from a school sweater smelling of defiance

A bundle of yellowing letters never sent

Once I held you close

an every day memory

.

I do not really keep my box,

So much as it keeps me

I’ve lived inside this box like a toy

.

Whatever you see of it, my dear,

Well, truth is, I see even less

It would have surrendered to the elements

Of mind and body by now

But I have emptied your contents to the wind

Setting me free

12 thoughts on “A Village Of Box (poem – cento)”

  2. For a first cento your Village of Box has hit the spot, Stephen. I love how the boxes are piling up, different voices calling out from your poem, vying for attention, and thank you for using lines from mine.

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  3. Thanks Kim, I really enjoyed this and jockeying back and forth through all the poems and scattering lines from them throughout to turn this into something new with a slightly different take on the “box” and was glad to have your poem help in the mix.

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  4. A conglomeration, or should I say, convocation of boxes, assembled as a village, their disparate elements held together by a common life, lived together. I am in awe of your developed this idea, tying it all up in one voice, one heart! (Ans so honored that you chose a poem of mine to draw from as well. Thank you!) I tried my hand at the cento and I just couldn’t make it work and didn’t want to blast everyone’s sanity (mine included) with a schizophrenic rendering. Alas.

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    1. Ahhh, thank you so much Dora, and you are too kind. 🙂 And yes, one voice, that was the intent, see if I could be bring all these separate voices together as one. So glad that you enjoyed that. And your poem and the lines I took addressing the reader worked so well for what I had in mind. Thanks.

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  5. This is really great! It has a cohesive flow of different voices and different boxes, and I think your voice speaks through that. Thank you for using lines from one of my poems, and thank you for writing for the prompt!

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  6. Thank you Melissa! And it does have a bit of a my voice feel I think, even though it is all thoughts and lines from other folks (minus one). Thanks for noting that!

    And I loved the prompt (and learned something too), so nicely done!

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  9. This is really good. It must be liberating, forgiving someone and letting them go. No point living in the box like a toy. I think the best ‘revenge’ you can take on someone who’s hurt you is to never let them live in your head, rent free.

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