"Haply I think on thee,--and then my state

(Like to the lark at break of day arising

From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate;" Shakespeare, Sonnet 29

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How to enter:

1. Subscribe to bondbooks.net and share this page on your social media sites.

2. Listen to The Scriptorium podcast: How to write a sonnet in 2 parts (click on tracks below right)

3. Write a sonnet:

--14 lines of iambic pentameter

--10 syllables per line, arranged in 5 iambs, that is two syllable units of unaccented/accented syllables

--consistent meter, accents falling on the natural spoken accented syllables of words

--employ poetic conventions of rhyming (abab, abcb, aabb, with rhyming couplet on final two lines 

--use figurative language appropriate to the theme of gratitude

--sonnets are a microcosm of life in a fallen world. Shakespeare often began with a problem, elaborated on and illustrated the extent of the problem, then in line nine began to point to a tentative solution, with the couplet wrapping up the episode with a poetic morsel of wisdom gained. The more specific the language and images the more potent the sonnet--use action verbs, concrete nouns, meaningful modifiers.

4. Submit to bondbooks.net@gmail.com by December 1, 2019 

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PRIZES:

3rd Prize is my Rise & Worship New Reformation Hymns album  and 20% discount for new registrants on spring 2020 Oxford Creative Writing Master Class

2nd Prize is my Rise & Worship New Reformation Hymns album and 30% discount for new registrants on spring 2020 Oxford Creative Writing Master Class

1st Prize is my new book God Sings!, a copy of my Rise & Worship New Reformation Hymns album, and a 40% discount for new registrants on spring 2020 Oxford Creative Writing Master Class

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Grand Prize is my new book God Sings!, a copy of my Rise & Worship New Reformation Hymns album, and 50% discount for new registrants on my Oxford Creative Writing Master Class June 15-22, 2019

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On The Scriptorium podcast How to Write a Sonnet, I will use Shakespeare's Sonnet 62, among others, as samples to illustrate how to write a sonnet:

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Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
And for this sin there is no remedy,
It is so grounded inward in my heart.
Methinks no face so gracious is as mine,
No shape so true, no truth of such account;
And for myself mine own worth do define,
As I all other in all worths surmount.
But when my glass shows me myself indeed
Beated and chopp'd with tanned antiquity,
Mine own self-love quite contrary I read;
Self so self-loving were iniquity.
'Tis thee, myself, that for myself I praise,
Painting my age with beauty of thy days.

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And the Bard's Sonnet 65 serves well as another example:

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Since brass, nor stone, nor earth, nor boundless sea,
But sad mortality o'er-sways their power,
How with this rage shall beauty hold a plea,
Whose action is no stronger than a flower?
O, how shall summer's honey breath hold out
Against the wreckful siege of battering days,
When rocks impregnable are not so stout,
Nor gates of steel so strong, but Time decays?
O fearful meditation! where, alack,
Shall Time's best jewel from Time's chest lie hid?
Or what strong hand can hold his swift foot back?
Or who his spoil of beauty can forbid?
   O, none, unless this miracle have might,
   That in black ink my love may still shine bright.

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For readers of Hand of Vengeance, I refer you to a sonnet I wrote based on the 8th c Anglo-Saxon setting of the book :

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“To arms! To arms!” the watchman cries in fear.

“A sail! A sail! The dragon ships are near!

The shields are set and now the sails are furled!

Now oars extend like claws that rend the world.

And men, like wolves, they grind us with their keels,

Our shores, our crops, our homes, beneath their heels.

With cleaving axe and ruthless blade, our wives

And tender bairns they shatter, and our lives.

Hold fast! The saintly warrior king appears,

And with him valiant thegns who turn our tears

To steadfast courage stout and purpose strong,

Who steel our will to stand against the wrong.

    To arms! To arms! Let not your valor quake!

    We’ll fight and die for our Defender’s sake!”

                            Douglas Bond (2012)

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Here is another sample sonnet, one I recently wrote on our visit to the ancient Augustinian priory of Kells in Ireland:

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Amidst the sighing breeze I heard the bells,

The Celtic abbey carillons of Kells;

With gaping doors and fortress towers they tell

And herald news to verdant hill and dell;

Their ancient summons ringing through the ruins

And mingling with the holy chants and tunes,

Devout, devoted echoes of the past

Of saints who lived to pray, to sing, to fast;

Dead scribe, his quill painstakingly with ink,

Prescribes good news that goads us on the brink,

Offends, convicts, that warns we infidels,

Illuminates the Gospel of the Kells.

          From giddy heights we scan the past with scorn,

          But we shall have eternity to mourn.

                                Douglas Bond (2019)