The Cries Of Wolves (Villanelle)

The cries of wolves hushed by winters grind

On cold nights when the air is bitter cold

The covering snow makes food hard to find

 

Mother and cubs caught natures confined

As its wet blanket covers ground twofold

The cries of wolves hushed by winters grind

 

This season events leave them in a bind

With the many blizzards the days grow old

The covering snow makes food hard to find

 

Low visuals, stormy days, left snow-blind

Since times beginning of which is age-old

The cries of wolves hushed by winters grind

 

As hunters search for them winters unkind

Their numbers not as before, as told

The covering snow makes food hard to find

 

Times uncertainties, leads with this blindfold

Their nonstop fight goes on, futures foretold

The cries of wolves hushed by winters grind

The covering snow makes food hard to find!

Reviews

[Shannen Forrester]

Wonderful imagery and wonderfully written, I couldn't help but notice that there isn't a single piece of punctuation until halfway through and there is only so many times you can use the word old, it seems a bit forced by the end, but otherwise it's really well done and a nice read.

[Pete Langley]

The theme is wonderful in it`s reality - of wolves, man and poets. The last stanza is the heart of the piece, as in all of this form and is delightful, but I find some of the expansion in the precedinng stanzas a little untidy, which detracts from an otherwise excellent piece. P.

[Mark]

Well, am I ever pleasantly surprised! Including myself, and one other (ironically also named Mark, but long since departed!), you make only the third writer of this delectable old form whom I have met on this site. I ignored it for a long while, thinking that the repetitions might make it feel somewhat trite...then I read Thomas's "Do Not Go Gentle Night", and I just knew I had to write one. (My first, also posted here, is called "Old Soldier", if you care to give it a look-see)
Your thoughts here are lovely, of the unavoidable plight of creatures in the wild, beset on all sides yet nobly persevering: the power of Nature as both aggressor and defender. I'd be interested in learning your method for composing a Villanelle. Thanks for a moving read.

[SheWolfNLust]

oh I'd love to read Old Soldier if you can please send me the link, I go over in to Shadow Poetry to learn a lot of the forms I've been learning and some I've learned in courses I try on ALL Poetry, mine I try to do in ten syllable lines, I just
like the balance I feel and love trying new forms, I do hope to grow and learn, I've started writing 9 yrs ago, but in the past few years I've really have tried to expand and grow, I hope what I put below helps you xoxo

http://www.shadowpoetry.com/index.html

A Villanelle is a nineteen-line poem consisting of a very specific rhyming scheme: aba aba aba aba aba abaa.

The first and the third lines in the first stanza are repeated in alternating order throughout the poem, and appear together in the last couplet (last two lines).

One of the most famous Villanelle is "Do not go Gentle into that Good Night" by Dylan Thomas.