RE: SteemitPoetryContest #12: Vires in Numeris
And as promised, here is the strictly-formatted three-quatrain rendering (though I really think it takes away from the flow of the poem):
Vires in Numeris
[strict formatting edition]
Tomorrow, with luck, we shall all tell a tale of a bear and a bull
and a fish and a whale and a cat and a mouse:
how the old ones devised to unravel our tracks
and defeat our disguise; how their efforts had ended in vain.
Tomorrow, with hope, we shall all stand as one giving freely to others;
no man with a gun shall point it at us
and demand compensation to rob and to rape
all the weak of our nations-- or natural-born rights to constrain.
Tomorrow, with triumph, we all shall declare o'er the waves of the seas
and the waves in the air: "Code is Law; Strength in Numbers!"
a people divorced from unchecked central power
delivered by force, though nary a bureaucrat slain.
I had that issue the first time I wrote a poem for it the other week. I was double checking the rules and then I noticed oh I have to many lines!
Part of the fun I find is having restrictions put in place that cause you to rethink and reshape.
I noticed after I finished it and was checking the rules. It works, but not as well. But I already created something I was proud of. Plus, as I said, this was for my followers first, and the contest second. So I decided I'd go with quality first, and if I get DQ'd for that, I'll try again next time.