The word ladder:
NOSE
The WoLaLy:
"Blind 'ayes' may have it, mind. But how fare eyes
of wine-dark hues or blues in spun-dried dyes
which fall on more than orb of Cyclops does...?"
Thus queries blondined Brit Diana Dors.
(Her drift, in Latin...? "Mihi lucrum mors." *)
Yet Di's from Venus, whereas I'm from Mars,
so loathe to lend my muted mutant's ears.
* To me, death be reward.
(a work in progress)
The Colloquy
WoLaLy's orthography is determined in a manner reminiscent of the
spelling method employed by certain fans of France's OuLiPo when
referencing that influential literary movement.
OuLiPo is shorthand for 'Ouvroir de litterature potentielle. WoLaLy
is shorthand for 'word ladder lyric.'
A word ladder is a series of words created by altering one letter in
the spelling of a beginning word to form a second word, then changing
one letter in that word to form a third word, and so on until a final
word is spelt, leaving a series of words.
An example: SOUP > SOUS > NOUS > NOTS > NUTS.
(The letter struck through is the letter altered; the letter in bold
is the letter substituted for the letter in that same position within the
word previous.)
A WoLaLy consists of a series of lines, the final word of each line
being one of the word ladder words taken in order.
A WoLaLy can also consist of a series of rhyming distichs, the final
word of alternating lines being one of the word ladder words taken in
order and the final word of the other line in the distich being a word
which rhymes with that particular word ladder word. The word ladder
word can end either the first or the second line of the distich.
When rhyming distichs are being attempted, the final word in each
odd-numbered line of each distich in order is one of the words of a word
ladder taken in order.
In that case the final word of each even-numbered line of each distich
in order is a word which rhymes with the final word of the line just above.
Thus rhyming distichs are formed.
Instead of appearing as the final word in odd-numbered lines of each
distich, it can appear as the final word in even-numbered lines; in either
case, the distichs generated are rhyming distichs, though, to repeat,
rhyming lines are not an essentiol component of the WoLaLy.
The meter of the lyric varies with each individual poem.
The total length of the lyric depends, of course, on the total number
of words in the source word ladder and whether or not distichs are
a feature of the scheme.
