SPOKEN SUNDAY: VILLANELLE: Metamorphosis

Sonneteer's Note: This is another contribution to #SpokenSunday, for which I've chosen, perhaps insanely, to write villanelles. CLICK HERE FOR THE AUDIO VERSION.


A car, a man, a skateboard -- that's the scene With which this tale of woe and change began.
No ambulance was called though. Instead, Dean,


Just took himself to urgent care. The keen
And frightful pain was hard to bear; the man
Had walked in on a fractured pelvis, green


And ailing. There was, too, a ruptured spleen,
The surgeons found, and told his wife, Diane,
He'd be as good as new. The breaks were clean.


The new hip was a splendid one. Unseen,
Its bearer formed a madly wild new plan,
And soon appeared in hospital, a mean


And urgent laceration in between
Two parts of one joint festered 'crossed that span.
Then more appearances, near seventeen.


An x-ray or airport detector screen
Would flag him as a menace on each scan.
He shrugs, though; that is just his new routine
(If there is still a ghost in that machine).

SPOKEN SUNDAY: VILLANELLE: Recruitment And Its Perils

Sonneteer's Note: This is my first contribution to #SpokenSunday, for which I've chosen, perhaps insanely, to write villanelles. CLICK HERE FOR THE AUDIO VERSION.

"A hard, hard thing, the journey into space;

No matter how luxurious the ship.

There's hardships it is best just to embrace

Recycled air and food, and, for to chase

That down, there's water that has made the trip

Through all your shipmate's kidneys. You must face

These difficulties and much more. And brace

Your fragile self: in order to equip

Our voyage, ere we leave the rocket base,

We must examine you, verify race

And health." The poster read. Undaunted, Skip,

Adventurous and young, signed up to chase

His dreams among the stars, and by the grace

Of unknown gods, he won out, got his chip

(To pay for necessaries). How his face

Lit up; that is until he found in place

Of his small bed, a monster! In its grip

He writhed to no avail. Such was the case,

Of scrumptious Skip, of whom there's now no trace.