Poetry Villanelle

Students often do not know the forms and rules of poetry. This villanelle keeps to the rules of the form while also offering some instruction, a look into the life of a poet, and a heaping dose of fun.
A villanelle is nineteen lines long, 5 stanzas of three lines and the final with four lines. The rhyme is aba throughout and the first line of the first stanza and third line of the same stanza are repeated in set locations, as appears here.
I began this one last night and got up at 5 a.m. today to complete it. Believe it or not, for those of us who love to write, it is delightful to stay up late and then get up early to do our craft. (I'm sure my students would cry out that I'm a nut job for getting out of bed so early on our first day of holiday break just to write!)
I hope you enjoy the first stanza.

Poetry Villanelle

Upside down, dangling – me – hanging from the poet tree.
Hands do flit, grasp at sound. Toes? They tap the beat around.
I live cadence, lyric, free. Verse has meter? Joyous be.

[Remainder of Villanelle will appear after April, 2008, because it is in a contest and cannot be published until winners have been announced.]