Reena’s Exploration Challenge #130 – Once upon a lifestyle

So once upon a lifestyle
Every decade or so it comes
It wriggles in, it comes, it drums

Out of nowhere and it is vile
Out of our seat, up on our feet
As the air, water, land defile

What we’ve done, this is the outcome
So once upon a lifestyle*

(c) ladyleemanila 2020

* The Octain, full name Octain Refrain, is a form of poetry developed by English poet Luke Prater in December 2010.

It comprises eight lines as two tercets and a couplet, either as octosyllables (counting eight syllables per line), or as iambic tetrameter, whichever is preferable. Trochaic tetrameter also acceptable. The latter yields a more propulsive rhythm, as opposed to iambs, which lilt.

As the name suggests, the first line is a refrain, repeated as the last (some variation of refrain acceptable). Rhyme-scheme as follows –

A-b-b
a-c/c-a
b-A

A = refrain line. c/c refers to…