Poem #20 for Poetry Month-Welsh-Cywydd Llosgyrnog

Today, a most unlikely match of form and content: a Welsh Cywydd Llosgyrnog, yes, say that three times in a lilting voice, and the stress experienced by a hockey fan watching her favourite teams struggle mightily. Full disclosure: I cheer for the Vancouver Canucks and the Winnipeg Jets. Heaven help me if they ever meet in the play-offs.

Picture a long-bearded Druid with Dylan Thomas’s voice dressed in a Winnipeg Jets T-shirt and jeans. With his face painted white, not Pict Blue. The Picts dyed themselves with woad, a much-in-vogue early medieval plant which I had seeds for once. I cannot remember what happened to them but I was warned they were highly invasive. Truth. But I digress.

This form has a syllabic line pattern as follows: 8 8 7 8 8 7

The rhyme scheme is deceptively simple too: A A B C C B but the A rhyming word must also rhyme with the middle word in line three and the C rhymed ending must agree with a word in line six. The oral tradition lineage is strong, of course. Lots of hooks embedded to jog the bard's brain cells onward. 

Okay, get your own team T-shirt on and listen up. Photo is of Jeff George (b. Boissevain, MB) and me (b.Fort St. John, BC) delighted to get tickets to a pre-season game in Winnipeg with the Jets and the Carolina Hurricanes in 2011. Full house. Full-on decibel roar. The Jets won that game. Go Jets!

Overtime in Winnipeg

The man in white and blue tumbles

The crowd, as one, lowly grumbles

Then rumbles, a mighty roar!

Our throats are wrecked, our mood is dark

We must win now, the end is stark

Nerves snap and arc, oh !%^*#!!, they score!