About Poetry – How to Write a Poem in the Donald Justice Form

In Donald Justice’s poem, “There is a gold light in certain old paintings,” it plays with both art and music and uses an interesting and (as far as I know) self-invented form.

His six-line stanzas use lines of twelve syllables, and while they don’t use rhyme, they repeat end words.

Specifically, the second and fourth line of each stanza repeat an end-word or syllable; the fifth and sixth lines also repeat their end-word or syllable. Today, we challenge you to write a poem that uses Justice’s invented form.

Here is one of my examples:

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CONTEMPLATION

I love our local art gallery where one can
Peruse its contents at leisure, drinking     in colour.
Texture, brushstrokes, concepts, and emotions that flow;
Busy and hurried, languid, and at peace, bright colour
Weaves its way into your brain, synapses firing.
Like a steam engine, with all cylinders firing!

You can walk through or just sit and stare at artwork.
Marvelling at its range as you contemplate it.
Here and there, it calls to you with its siren song.
The music of art - sinuous, pulsing through it.
The river is on its way to the sea, waves 
rise,
And fall, crashing upon death's lonely shore, we rise.

Let us paint the Summerlands* of our afterlife!
Let us imbue it with our beautiful colour.
Paint our texture with spirit's energy and flow.
Let our energy reverberate with colour.
Joyous reunions, love, and light resounding 
Dynamic art, music vibrating, resounding. 

©🦊VixenOfVerse,  2025

*The Summerlands are where the souls of witches reside in the afterlife.

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