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Write Under the Moon #10 Poetry Challenge: Stornello
The Night Rain Danced Flamenco
Such happiness they would never have again
Last week, Tree Langdon invited us to join her in a stornello poetry challenge. She explained that a stornello is a single three-line stanza with an aaa rhyme scheme and each line has 11 syllables. A poem made up of multiple stornello stanzas is known as a stornelli. It’s a form that originated in Tuscany, Italy, as a type of lyric poetry.
For the challenge, I opted for a 3-stanza stornelli with a Spanish touch. I hope you like what I’ve done.
Rain danced flamenco on the windowsill
Reflecting moonlight like splinters of crystal
The magic of that night she remembered still
Tender-sweet memories of their time in Spain
Where they drank sangria and danced in the rain
Such happiness they would never have again
Civil war soon after claimed her handsome beau
Their love their secret that no one else would know
Two hearts bonded broken like a Picasso
© Carolyn Hastings 2025
From the Archives
I knew I had a stornello buried somewhere in Medium’s archives, so I dived in, and surprise, surprise, I found it! — a story published in August 2021.
And surprise, surprise, I discovered something else….
…according to the notes that accompanied the poem, I was the first person on Medium to use the ‘stornello’ tag — I actually made the tag! 😅
Many thanks to Tree for inviting me to join the stornello challenge, and to Claire Kelly and the editorial team at Write Under the Moon for making it all possible. 🙏 💖
Details about the stornello poetry challenge can be found here —
Thank you for reading and supporting my writing. 🙏 💕
