Happy September! Welcome to a new Carrot Ranch double ennead monthly poetry challenge. Every third Monday of the month, I’ll be here at the Saloon with another challenge to help get your poetic juices flowing. Each month, we will explore a different theme or image to inspire our poetry. Take your time, there’s no hurry! You have an entire month to write your poem.
HINT: You can find this post again by typing: double ennead challenge in the search box to the right of the Carrot Ranch banner. That will bring up the most recent challenge post. ❤
Check out the poems from last month HERE
The word Ennead means nine, and a double nine is ninety-nine! Carrot Ranch is famous for 99-word flash fiction. Now, the ranch has its own syllabic poetry form written in 99 syllables!
The Double Ennead comprises five lines with a syllable count of 6/5/11/6/5, (33 SYLLABLES per stanza) 3 STANZAS EACH = 99 SYLLABLES, NO MORE, NO LESS! Punctuation and rhyme schemes are optional and up to the poet.
With the first day of Autumn quickly approaching on September 22nd, my thoughts naturally turn to pumpkin spice, hot apple desserts, and warm cuddly blankets. Think about how this season interacts with our five (or six) senses: taste, touch, sight, smell, and hearing.
“Your five senses help you take in information from the world around you. These senses are also a powerful tool to use when you’re writing. They help convey a message to readers by providing a strong image in their heads.” Source: https://www.familyfriendpoems.com/poem/article-5-senses-in-poetry
For example, think about Autumn and describe it using your five senses:
- Taste: pumpkin spice, mulling spices, apples, pears, harvest foods, etc.
- Touch: wet rain, cold fog, warm sunlight, soft blankets, bonfires, etc.
- Sight: leaf piles, fall color, red gold and orange leaves, wheat sheaves, corn stalks, bales of hay, pumpkins, etc.
- Smell: wet, moldy, wet leaves, decayed leaves, pumpkin spice, baked bread, etc.
- Hearing: autumn rains, cool or stormy winds blowing, geese honking in migratory flocks, etc.
My example follows:
"Lady Autumn" welcome Lady Autumn— wet dew on grasses, foggy sunrise awash over the fenland sunshine between shadows, chilly to the touch red-tipped maples glitter embracing the Queen of all seasons, trouping their finest colors like burnished leaves displayed in a royal crown nothing gilded can stay every leaf must fall for a vivid autumn is death's finest hour cold rain despoils the bracts death, decay follow © 2021 Colleen M. Chesebro
This month, write a double ennead poem dedicated to Autumn. Pay special attention to sensory words.
- Post it on your blog or in the comments if you don’t have a blog.
- Include a link back to this challenge in your post. (copy the https:// address of this post into your post).
- Read and comment on your fellow poet’s work. Feedback from other poets is how we grow our poetry writing craft.
- Like and leave a comment below if you choose to do so.
- I’ll visit, comment, and share your poetry on social media!
Now have fun and write some double ennead poetry!
Carrot Ranch Literary Community 
Beautiful, Colleen. I love your example. You make it look so easy.
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Oh my gosh, it took me around an hour to write the poem. Thanks, Norah. I played with different words to get the right meaning. I can’t force it. I have to let the words come naturally. 🧡🍂
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It’s lovely.
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I love Autumn! I think I’ll have a go at this one 🙂
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Great! Let the words flow! ❤
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Here we are: https://eacolquitt.wordpress.com/2021/09/20/september-time/
Some senses are more prominent than others, but this is only my first double ennead! Also, here’s my poem in the clearer font you get with these comments lol:
September Time
The Indian summer
swansong brings wasps out,
their buzzing, sharp, stripey warning. Time to hide!
Rain brings aural release.
Sweet, steaming cocoa.
Music no longer rings
through screens from Albert
Hall, for cakes and sequins mist up TV, now:
icy eyes stalk the tent,
before glitter-belles
and joyful Johannes
feast on fashion. Time
to flaunt my colours: deep green, bold burgundy,
and thick, rich-purple socks.
Time for Autumn’s shine.
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Yes! Flaunt the colors!
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How beautiful! I love your imagery. This is a fun form to write. I’m so glad you jumped into this challenge. ❤
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Great colors to flaunt, especially the socks!
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Thanks, everyone. I really enjoyed the ‘puzzle’ of fitting everything into 99 syllables (same with the 99-word flashes!). I’m afraid it’s pure vanity, really – I’m an Autumn, in terms of colour seasons lol. Always here for a good pair of socks, though ❤
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Reblogged this on ShiftnShake and commented:
Head on over and see Colleen Chesebro at the Saddle Up Saloon. Below is my response to her monthly double ennead challenge. Points awarded if you see how I bent the rules of the double ennead form.
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Breathe in Autumn’s harvest.
nature’s smudging cleanse!
Every step a cidery press of scents
green melting in fall fire
summer ferns kneel brown.
See Autumn’s praise-songs.
Gatherings of voices!
Choired trees exalting in crackling colored tongues
tart air an apple bite
wing strokes flute bell skies.
Hear Autumn’s palette.
Offerings of colors!
Quicksilvered moonshadow songs of coyotes
red leaves’ raining patter
blue forgotten dreams.
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You know… it’s still 99 syllables no matter how you get there. LOL! All five of your senses are on overdrive and I love it. Your imagery is stunning, D. ❤
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Aw, thanks. It’s a hard prompt to resist, this one, and all I had to do was look around me, and here it is. Autumn. I appreciate your flexibility with syllable arrangement! The double ennead’s been around long enough now, folks is sure to mess with it. 🙂
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I need to say that in the next challenge. As long as we have 99 syllables, we should be good! LOL! 😀
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And, it’s important to pay respects and to practice a form true to form before tweaking it. Just like any recipe. I did what I did to maintain the sort of repetitions in the beginning of the stanzas. But (mostly) adhering to the form made for a better poem, more focused and I like that I went longer than I might have but knew when to stop. I was going to try rhyming too but that was too much for me today and when you have another structure, like the repeating syllable count, it still stands as a poem. Yep, the double ennead is a thing. Good on ya, Colleen.
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Your 11-word lines are a joy to the ears! My favorite was “Quicksilvered moonshadow songs of coyotes.”
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I love this. Along with Colleen’s example above, I can really feel the cold mists when reading!
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[…] From 20/9/21 to 20/10/21, the prompting theme/image is: ‘write a double ennead poem dedicated to Autumn. Pay special attention to sensory words: taste, touch, sight, smell, hearing.’ […]
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[…] Saddle-up Saloon; Colleen’s Double Ennead Challenge No. 8 Carrot Ranch Literary Community. […]
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Not quite what you asking for, Colleen, but as I sat in the Gymnasium, scrutineering for my political candidate, who won reelection, by the way, I worked on this one…The Shape of the Season-A Taste of a Canadian Fall Election
A light sprinkling of rain,
a hum of voices,
a slow-moving line of Covid citizens,
a masked electorate
democracies feat.
The Gymnasium is cool,
fresh autumn air flows,
a penetrating sound shakes the old hall.
Rusty bolts on the move
as hammers pound in.
From eleven to one
scrutineering fun,
carrot, banana, orange, nary a gun
under grey cloudy skies
we shall overcome.
http://www.engleson.ca
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An autumn election from our northern neighbors certainly works for me! Thank goodness it worked out. I personally felt a sense of relief. It’s brilliant imagery which is what I was looking for. 🧡🍂
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[…] CR Double Ennead #8 This month, write a double ennead poem dedicated to Autumn. Pay special attention to sensory words. …think about Autumn and describe it using your five senses: (I think I’ve touched on the senses all though not specifically…And have used autumn as a season of life to fit with the other prompts) The Double Ennead comprises five lines with a syllable count of 6/5/11/6/5, (33 SYLLABLES per stanza) 3 STANZAS EACH = 99 SYLLABLES, NO MORE, NO LESS! Punctuation and rhyme schemes are optional and up to the poet. […]
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I saddled sideways and went in a slightly different direction… (I think I’ve touched on the senses, all though not specifically…And have used autumn as a season of life to fit with the other prompts):
Esprit Egression
Esprit Egression
(Double Ennead)
In the autumn of life
The inkwell was still
in use by the paper thin skinned hand that now
shook just a little more
while filling the page
Letters scritchity scratched
Black India Ink
Ran, danced, echoed memories real and
Imagined from the pen
Capturing moments
Until the cold winter
Arrived leaving just
The bare bones to drape on the author’s desk chair
Would fame come now that death
Had taken all else?
© JP/dh
Esprit: sprightliness of spirit or wit; lively intelligence.
Egression: egress; a going out
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That’s fabulous, Jules! I like where you went with the prompt! Yes… I love the imagery in your words. This: “…paper thin skinned hand…” tells us the age of the person writing without saying they are x number of years old. I love this description. ❤
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I ‘modeled’ that line after some of my grandmother’s hands…
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Excellent description. I like that. ❤
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Fame awaits the bold and the dead, Jules. I think perhaps fame after life would be the easier transition for paper-skinned author who has inked quietly through life undisturbed by paparazzi.
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You reminded me of a book I read of a gal who avoided the paparazzi – a writer, who then went disguised to her families hotel just to keep tabs on them – to make sure that they weren’t taking advantage of her largess. Complicated murder mystery – but the family had a replica of the authors house to give tours etc.
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I love your poem, Colleen, and I love the lead up to Halloween in the USA.
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Thanks, Robbie. I love Autumn. You’re at the opposite end of the spectrum and spring is starting for you, right?
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Yes, and I love spring and summer. Autumn is nice but I hate winter.
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LOL! I’ve gotten to the place where I appreciate all of the seasons. I shouldn’t complain at all. ❤
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Okay, Colleen, I chose courage over comfort. I broke out of my prose-only familiarity and counted lines and actually enjoyed the pattern. Not sure if I got what I set out for but it’s my first. Thanks for our inspiration!
In the Shadow of Pumpkin Lattes & Fall Sightseeing by Charli Mills
pumpkin spiced hot coffee
lures locals to drive
thru the steel girders of the Keweenaw lift bridge
defying construction
zones and stalled traffic
cars emit fuel fumes waiting
to hum across the
water that divides the peninsula
where colorful autumn leaves
beckon fall tourists
the taste of pumpkin spice
erases the thought
that it wasn’t worth the costs to cross the bridge
denial or excess
we thrill to burn gas
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That’s fabulous, Charli. You picked up on the natural rhythm! I love how you ended up with conservation message in conjunction with Autumn! Yay! You did it! 🍂🧡🍂
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Ha! I didn’t pay attention to rhythm, I just kept counting. The double ennead works like a word constraint in the way that counting prevented me from overthinking. Thanks for the growth!
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It’s like a word puzzle. It really makes you pay attention to your word choice.
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[…] ✖ written for: Saddle-up Saloon, Double Ennead Challenge #8 […]
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Lovely poem Colleen 🙂 it certainly captures the essences and ambiance of Autumn, in all her/its complexity.
I’m not a huge fan of syllabic poetry, but I did spend some time tinkering with this new-to-me form and came up with several different versions/ideas. I’m not sure I managed to really dig into Autumn from a sensory perspective – too many aspects to consider, but nonetheless, it was an interesting experience and form to try. Thanks for hosting the challenge 🙂
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You’re most welcome. Syllabic poetry, like flash fiction, teaches us how to dabble in precise word choice. Of course, my favorites are the Japanese forms, haiku, tanka, etc. I like inferred meanings in poetry and there can be more than one way of interpreting the words. Syllabic poetry isn’t for everyone, but I’m thrilled you gave it a chance.
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[…] of 33 syllables in a 6/5/11/6/5 pattern for a total off 99 syllables. The challenge is hosted by Colleen Chesebro over at Carrot Ranch. It runs once a month and I invite you to check it out. Colleen’s prompt this month was […]
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[…] invites us to write a Double Ennead about autumn. Click HERE for the […]
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my link is here^ my muse left me. I decided to submit anyway. hopefully next month (few days?) my muse and i will be working together again!
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We all need breaks. I need a huge break. My muse wants to break up with me because she’s worn out! 🤣🤦🏼♀️😍
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[…] poem inspired by Colleen’s Monthly Double Ennead Challenge #8 – click through on this link, if you’d like to join in on this one! The prompt was to use your […]
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[…] Follow the link to the challenge HERE […]
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