Admin Post: The Poetry Page: Social Distancing with Mrs. Hudson

[scfrankles]

Things are starting to look a little brighter, but we mustn’t let our guard down and we still have to maintain the social distancing. But there are ways of communicating from a safe distance and I thought we could try one of them. I have already passed out the necessary equipment—yes, today we will be learning the language of fans!

What’s that, Mrs. Frankles? Yes, indeed, the language of fans is generally considered to be a flirtatious one. But I think we can expand it to other areas. Simply flirting with each other doesn’t sound very interesting to me—indeed, I myself am impervious to flirting and—

Hmm, Mrs. Frankles?

Yes, I suppose that is quite sensible of me… You really think it shows great intelligence too? And wisdom? Oh, that’s— And what, this dress? I’m really pleased you think it’s a good choice and that the colour flatters me. That’s so kind. Oh dear, I rather think I’m perhaps blushing just a little—

Oh.

Yes, thank you, Mrs. Frankles. I think you’ve made your most amusing point. Please keep your shop assistant’s wiles to yourself in future.



So! Here is a list of possible permutations of the fan and their associated meanings.



You can keep to those or invent some of your own. To inspire you in the code of fans and also in the writing of poetry, here is a quotation from Dr. Watson’s retelling of Mr. Holmes’ story, “The Adventure of the Gloria Scott”:


”He must have misread it. If so, it must have been one of those ingenious secret codes which mean one thing while they seem to mean another.”



Here as usual is the list of poetry forms:

221B verselet, abecedarian poetry, acrostic poetry, alexandrine, ballad, barzelletta, beeswing, blackout poetry, blitz poem, blues stanza, bref double, Burns stanza, call and response, chastushka, cherita, cinquain, circular poetry, clerihew, clogyrnach, colour poems, compound word verse, concrete poetry, Cornish verse, curtal sonnet, débat, décima, descort, diamante, doggerel, double dactyl, echo verse, ekphrasis, elegiac couplet, elegiac stanza, elfje, englyn, enuig, epigram, epistle, epitaph, epulaeryu, Etheree, fable, Fib, florette, found poetry, free verse, ghazal, haiku, hay(na)ku, In Memoriam stanza, Italian sonnet, jueju, kennings poem, lanturne, lies, limerick, line messaging, list poem, lyric poetry, mathnawī, micropoetry, mini-monoverse, musette, nonsense verse, palindrome poetry, pantoum, Parallelismus Membrorum, poem cycle, puente, quatern, quintilla, renga, rhyming alliterisen, riddle, rimas dissolutas, rime couée, rispetto, Schüttelreim, sedoka, septet, sestina, shadorma, sonnet, stream of consciousness, tanka, tercet, terza rima, tongue twister poetry, triangular triplet, tricube, trine, triolet, Tyburn, villanelle, xenolith


And so on to discreet and distanced communication!