Please note that none of this is personal, it's just a debate/question/issue I'd like to talk about in regards to the forms of something we've recently encountered on YWS, palindromes.
What is a Palindrome
A palindrome, in general, is something that is read the same forwards and backwards. Poets have taken that and twisted it into you read it "forwards and backwards" but you get a new meaning by reading it 'backwards,' like seeing the mirror actually shows you something new. There are many different types.
Types
The most common on the internet are 'letter' palindromes: "Anna", "Was it a car or a cat I saw," and "racecar."
However, in poetry they are much more diverse which is not so much up for debate, as discussion. Palindromes can be on the level of mirroring stanzas:
"We can be
as happy
as we want
as happy
we can be"
[this could also be considered a 'line-unit' palindrome because the entire line is taken and over the reflection.]
or lines:
"Suddenly I saw
her. There she sat
watching
sat she there, her
I saw suddenly"
[these are also called 'word-unit' palindromes because the individual words of the lines are taken and reflected.]
They are both 'legal' in terms of reflection. Both are easily seen as reversed. The issue comes up with some questions of how to deliver the palindromes to the public.
Examples
Here are a few examples of 'published' palindromes. [At least, I could find them online and they seemed credible, I included sources for you to peruse.]
The 224 Word Palindrome:
Spoiler! :
Line Palindromes from a place talking about poetic forms:
Spoiler! :
A stanza palindrome:
Spoiler! :
Similarities
Between all of them, we see some similar things. The key thing I want to talk about is something the palindromes on here seem to ignore; the reflective point is reflecting. While there is not much to really know about palindromes as poems, and they're really kind of confusing because there aren't many cited examples on the internet, they are mostly universal in that they have a reflective spot.
In the first poem, it is very hard to find. it is actually the "I" the 14th line down.
The next two are both examples which really give away the reflective spot.
The last poem does not have a distinct reflective point but two lines back to back which are the same to show the reflection between lines.
Even in simple palindromes like "Anna" we get reflection points which are either the odd letter out in the middle, or the repetition of a letter right next to itself.
Grammar
Because the first example is a letter palindrome instead of lines, or stanzas ['words-units' and 'line-units'] the lines and stanzas don't have to match. The words don't even have to be the same. There is no need in palindromes to keep the same punctuation, spaces, or anything of the sort as long as it is the same in the essence of its unit backwards and forwards.
Why am I writing this?
Recently on YWS, a few palindromes have shown up, and while they read really well, I feel that they are only half complete. Reading a palindrome should be like reading any other poem, you read it through once straight, and you don't have to fiddle around with anything extra.
To me this is like bagging up the things a customer buys. Even though the item is theirs already, there's still a common courtesy that shops pay them in order to get them out the door.
Format for this Discussion
Well, you say, this should go in a review for the palindromes up on YWS and not bogging down the Poetry Discussion form.
You're probably right but I am running into more and more people on YWS who believe that palindromes can exist as the reflective point being at the end of the poem and a simple instruction "this is a palindrome, read it backwards after you read it forwards" seems to appease them into doing just that.
Personally, I'd also like to see if there is something that I'm missing which you all seem to know/see/read about palindromes which makes it acceptable to only write to the reflective point.
The reason I know it is just to the reflective point is because they don't actually have any mirrored parts. I have not found a palindrome anywhere else that does not include after the reflection. This anomaly has only happened here.
While the first one which showed up did seem to have a reflective idea, it was warped and the words were bluntly changed not matching the spirit of the first line, which means that the lines were new, and it was not a reflection of the idea.
So here's the question I pose to start this topic, should palindromes follow the behavior of having a reflective point?
Wait! I Wanted to Write One!
If you're here for how to write a palindrome, here are two helpful guides:
Spoiler! :
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