A Cleave poem
in the form of two Shadormas
Chanukah | festival | |
with bright atmosphere | permeating through ~ | |
filling our | Jewish homes; | |
children’s hearts; | families | |
has left glowing memories | held together by warm love | |
lasting forever | across gen’rations |
How to read a cleave poem?
Simply:
- Read the left hand poem as a first discrete poem.
- Read the right hand poem as a second discrete poem.
- Read the whole as a third integrated poem.
Shadorma
- The Shadorma is a Spanish poetic form made up of a stanza of six lines with no set rhyme scheme (rhyme is optional);
- It is a syllabic poem with a meter of 3/5/3/3/7/5;
- It can have many stanzas, as long as each follows the meter.
#TankaTuesday
The above was written for Colleen M. Chesebro’s ‘Tanka Tuesday’ prompt.
Let’s write poetry together!

When it comes to partnership, some humans can make their lives alone – it’s possible. But creatively, it’s more like painting: you can’t just use the same colours in every painting. It’s just not an option. You can’t take the same photograph every time and live with art forms with no differences.
–Ben Harper (b. 1969)
Would you like to create poetry with me and have a completed poem of yours featured here at the Skeptic’s Kaddish? I am very excited to have launched the ‘Poetry Partners’ initiative and am looking forward to meeting and creating with you… Check it out!
Beautiful, David. I love this poem. ❤️❤️
🧡 Jeff 🧡 – thank you!
Lovely! You have truly mastered this form, David.
Much love,
D
I’m only a master of disaster, Dolly – nothing more 😉
❤
David
Ms Manners teaches that we have to learn to accept compliments gracefully. Please do!
Air hugs,
D
Ok! Dear Dolly, thank you kindly for the very kind compliment!
Much love,
David
LOL It was sincere, too.
This is so beautiful. Love how you’ve married the two parts into a whole, without detracting from the beauty of each separate part. Such a unique form: inspiring!
❤ ❤ Anna ❤ ❤ – thank you so much!
-David
Oooh an new form… I haven’t quite seen that before. I bet you could ‘Cleave’ with other forms too.
If I look at the rules and they say no, I’ll do it anyway!! I’m a rebel that way!
It is always a joy to celebrate together. We are lucky to have much respect in our interfaith family.
Hope you and yours are over your ‘colds and sniffles’. 😀
we’re mostly better, Jules – thanks 🙂
(my wife’s still not 100%, but she’s gradually getting there…)
❤
David
*That’s good!*
Marvelously penned David!👌🏻I hoped you had a warm Chanukah. Love is always the answer. ❤
Love is not the answer, Filipa…
Love is the question.
“Yes” is the answer 🤡
❤ David ❤
A wonderful poem and beautifully crafted, David!
❤ Eugi ❤ – thank you; I really appreciate it!
Sincerely,
David
David, a gorgeous, heartwarming poem using a very challenging poetic form. Lovely photo! I see that someone remembered the donuts! 🙂 ❤ 🙂
it’s a free photo from some site I found via Google, Cheryl 😉
(and – thanks!)
Ohhh shardomas!! I gotta return to writing freeverse, been a while since I wrote shardomas. 😀 But nice cleave poem! Happy Chanukah, even if it’s passed!
you know, it just struck me not so long ago that almost any form of poetry could be turned into a cleave 😉
Ok, here’s a challenge then: write a cleave poem using a couple of atoms! 🙂
oh – you’ve got me… that would actually be quite hard. the letter limits are tough as they are without the cleave! but I could try… maybe I will eventually 🙂
Yep, that’s all you need to do- try.
Fantastic David ! Top notch poem ! Your interest in writing different kind of poems is quite inspiring but your are far too high to catch up 👏👏👍🤝💐
❤ Srikanth ❤ – you are so sweet, but that’s simply not true… keep in mind that English is my native tongue!
-David
Shadorma’s one of my go-to short forms and clearly lends itself well to the cleave (at least in masterful hands like yours.) Great stuff. Thanks.
🧡💖 Ron 💖🧡
nicely done 🙂
💘🖤 Thanks, Art 🖤💘
-David
Wonderful arrangement of the poetic form. Beautifully penned. Happy Chanukah 🙂
Thank you! Sadly, it’s already over, Suzette… We’re already looking fwd to next year 🕎
🧸
David
Oh okay. Well happy next year!
❤ Suzette ❤