POETIC PUZZLING
What is The Water Mage’s Daughter? Well, it’s an epic poem in English, yes. And sure, it features thousands of rhymes in different schemes. But along with telling a killer story, it’s also a very cool word puzzle. How? Well, by the time you’ve reached page 347, you’ve read heroic couplets and quatrains in Canticles I and II. They’re fun. Canticle III, however, which up until now has featured “whorls” that rhyme from the outside in, throws out some fresh craziness with words. Here’s the spot in the text where I offer the puzzle:
First, through free verse our tale will wend,
Then back to couplets t’ward the end,
Yet each end-word shall kiss a mate
Somewhere––that’s if you take the bait
And feed on fancy, that old stuff
We love…
In other words, every end-word in the canto (chapter) will rhyme with another end-word somewhere. It may be pretty far away, but it’s in there. So if you’re into word puzzles, this makes for an amusing hunt.
It’s not until 60 pages later that the poem modulates completely back to couplets and stays there.
–Odds Bodkin
