Like all types of sonnets, a Petrarchan sonnet is fourteen lines. It is sometimes called an Italian sonnet, and it has a specific rhyming pattern and two distinct halves.
The first half is an octet (eight lines); the second half is a sestet (six lines). The octet establishes an initial idea, problem, or emotional state, and the sestet responds to it. The liminal space between the first and second parts is called a volta, which means turn.
If those weren’t rules enough, the octet of a Petrarchan sonnet always follows the same rhyming scheme: ABBA ABBA. There is more fluidity with the sestet, although the most common scheme is CDCDCD.
Petrarchan sonnets are often about the poet lamenting an unattainable love, but this one is about love and a snowman. Happy New Year, everyone.
I remembered a promise from new year’s last
With but hours to go before the ball doth drop
To build you a snowman with a hat on top
To revive a vow made from our distant past.
How lucky today the snow has amassed
I pack and roll while birds in trees eavesdrop
Penny eyes, twig smile, carrot for a prop
His fate beholden to the weather forecast.
Someday he must melt in a warming sun
Or tip and topple when he grows too old
Next year I’ll keep the same resolution
To express with snow if I may be so bold
My love for you to never come undone
Like our snowman desires the air be cold.
