Aesthetic Terrain
Aesthetic Terrain:
Five Line Poems
By Olive
Cinquains
Illustration of two vintage keyboard instruments side by side—a harpsichord and a clavichord—featuring a retro color palette with teal, red, and tan tones on a beige background.
Well-Tempered Clavier

Baroque
Preludes and fugues.
Clavichord. Harpsichord.
Formal structure. Complex domain.
Wanda.

Illustration of a Viking warrior with a horned helmet and fur-lined armor sitting at a desk, holding a pen and thinking over an open notebook, set against a warm yellow background.
Scandinavian poet-in-training

Oof-da (A Norwegian)
I’m here again.
Trying to write a cinquain
About something dreary and remorseful
Uff da! (A Swede)

Limericks
Split-screen illustration of two coastal landscapes, each forming the silhouette of a face in profile—one side showing a lush green setting with cliffs and historic buildings, the other a warmer-toned urban seascape with red buildings and a donkey statue.
There once was a mountain in Maine,
Who longed for a valley in Spain.
But the climates annoyed,
The trysts were “trop froid.”
And love went the way of terrain.
Stylized retro illustration of a person hiking uphill through a snowy path between pine trees, with an orange and yellow sky illuminating distant mountains.
A milieu is a type of terrain.
We might say the same of “domain.”
Tread lightly in all.
You’re quite likely to fall,
Experiencing pain, (sprain, or strain) once again.
Acrostic
retro style illustration of a skiier
Sideways, I hope not
Lengthwise, usually
Oblong, for sure
Perpendicular, sometimes
Even tempered, always.
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