Illusion/Reality/Vision: Playing with the Rondelet

Tony Maude's prompt at dVerse Form For All today is the rondelet, a form I hadn't tried before. At first I challenged myself by using a non-traditional meter: dactylic instead of iambic. Quite hard! And the result metrically imperfect. (The space before the last line was created accidentally by Blogger, but I think it works for this poem and decided to keep it.) Then I thought I'd do a traditional rondelet but I made mistakes in the rhyme scheme and number of lines! Finally I managed a traditional one. So here they are in order. Of course they are variations on my current theme of bereavement, which I'm afraid is going to take some time to exhaust.

Illusion

(non-traditional rondelet)

Now I am dreaming and

you are here lying beside me as always you …

Now I am dreaming and

no tears are streaming and

out goes my hand and it reaches and yes, stays you

back from your death that is waiting and betrays you.

How I am dreaming! End.

Reality

(rondelet variation)

You're nine months dead.

The cats at last begin to spread

through spaces where you used to be.

You're nine months dead.

They sprawl upon the marriage bed

or on the couch alongside me;

don't leave you room, respectfully —

you're nine months dead.

Vision

(traditional rondelet)

A core of light

still radiates, I like to think:

a core of light

that gleams within this winter night,

pin-pointing you beyond the brink

of death and darkness ... this one link.

A core of light.