A typical sunny summer day is depicted here. I wrote this poem with this picture specifically in mind. The scene has a swimming beach, picnic area, and playground in the background. But what is in the foreground, but a quiet shaded area under a tree? Now that's for me! The spot is at Carver Lake in Woodbury, Minnesota.

This poem is an Inverted Sonnet.
An Inverted Sonnet is one what is known as the Modern Sonnets. Modern Sonnets, however, don't necessarily follow the same rules as more traditional Sonnets. While there were once strict rules about how many lines could be in a Sonnet, how many syllables had to be in every line, and the rhyme scheme the Sonnet had to follow, the writers of Modern Sonnets have much more freedom when it comes to structure and rhyme. It can be difficult to distinguish different types of Modern Sonnets because the purpose of the modern poetry writers who write these types of poems is often to break the rules. In fact, Modern Sonnets have a lot in common with Free Form, also known as Free Verse, poetry. However, while similar to Free Form poetry in many ways, Modern Sonnets tend to have a bit more structure and will have certain characteristics that will classify it as a Sonnet.

One specific type of Modern Sonnet, most famously penned by Elizabeth Bishop, is the Inverted Sonnet. While the traditional Sonnet is classified as having exactly 14 lines and a strict rhyming scheme, an Inverted Sonnet will have 14 lines with an opening rhyming couplet rather than a closing couplet found in traditional Sonnets. It may even start with an opening couplet, but the remaining lines could be written in free form. A Sonnet that's been split in half, with each section having its own tone and style, might also be referred to as an Inverted Sonnet. The meter and line length may vary in this format. Source: The wiseGEEK and Wikipedia.

For this poem I used iambic tetrameter. I also structured the rhyme scheme so that the rhyme of the opening couplet blended into an abba type enveloping scheme in the last stanza. But that is not a requirement. So, for this poem, the rhyme scheme is:
aa bcbc dede agga,

where a traditional Sonnet rhyme scheme would be:
abab cdcd efef gg

This phothgraph was taken by the author himself on August 19, 2011.

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