sherlock60 | Mrs. Hudson's Poetry Page: The Sign of Four, Chaps. 1-4

Welcome once again to my poetry page!

I hope each week you will read Dr. Watson’s delightful narrative and then go on to write a poem related to it in some way. All forms of poetry are permitted, and further down the page there is a selection you might like to consider using over the coming weeks.

And here, courtesy of my housemaid Rachel, is this week’s suggested poem to read—a suggestion inspired by the themes and subjects in this week's story. Hopefully you will enjoy the poem, and perhaps it may give you some ideas for a poem of your own or allow you to look at Dr. Watson's story in a new way.

Alone

by Edgar Allan Poe

Note from Rachel: The reasons behind Mr. Holmes's indulgence in cocaine have puzzled many. The good Dr. Watson sometimes talks about his addiction as if it were a demon, a "fiend" that never dies but only sleeps. In this poem, a man looks back on his childhood and into the contradictions of his own heart and mind, remembering the first moment he sensed a dark force on his life's horizon. (Edgar Allan Poe wrote this poem by hand for a girl named, amazingly enough, Miss Lucy Holmes.)

Thank you so much to Rachel. And here is my suggested form to revisit this week: the mini-monoverse. (The link takes you back to a previous poetry page.)

But you do not have to use that form. Any form of poetry is welcome this week—and every week! Here are a few suggestions for you:

221B verselet, abecedarian poetry, acrostic poetry, alexandrine, ballad, beeswing, blackout poetry, blues stanza, bref double, Burns stanza, call and response, chastushka, cinquain, circular poetry, clerihew, colour poems, concrete poetry, Cornish verse, curtal sonnet, diamante, doggerel, double dactyl, ekphrasis, elegiac couplet, elegiac stanza, elfje, englyn, epigram, epitaph, epulaeryu, Etheree, fable, Fib, florette, found poetry, ghazal, haiku, In Memoriam stanza, Italian sonnet, jueju, kennings poem, lanturne, limerick, lyric poetry, mathnawī, micropoetry, mini-monoverse, palindrome poetry, pantoum, Parallelismus Membrorum, poem cycle, quintilla, renga, riddle, rime couée, Schüttelreim, sedoka, septet, sestina, sonnet, tanka, tercet, terza rima, tongue twister poetry, triangular triplet, triolet, Tyburn, villanelle

Please leave all your poems inspired by The Sign of Four in the comments on this post. I look forward to seeing them!

Warm regards,

Mrs. Hudson