Box Poems Or Cube Poems

by Christopher Sanderson

I was watching the television documentary about Yo-Yo Ma and The Silk Road Ensemble; I very much had an urge to write poetry, within fifteen minutes the idea for Box or Cube Poems was born; in the middle of that night I got out of my bed and constructed the first poem, Box 1.In the Monday Morning Writers’ Café I explained the concept and committed to this being my next project; however it quickly became an obsession, the writing happened quickly, both within and without of the Writers’ Café.Other writers tried the form, some putting their existing poems into the form, others starting completely afresh; all found they could make it work, even those, like myself, who were not too fond of form in the first place.For me the beauty is in the unexpected repetitions; I haven’t been too prescriptive about how the box or cubes are laid out, other than they always have six faces and twelve lines.The order of the faces gives factorial 6 possible combinations, the order of the lines gives factorial 12, or 4.790016x108 which seems a very large number indeed.I hope you will try to write a box poem yourself; draw the box, number the lines; each of the six faces with its corresponding line number is a stanza, the repetition occurs as the repetition occurs, be aware to be surprised.

92 pages, Paperback

Published June 5, 2018