Splitting the Rhyme: A Poetic Challenge from the Nursery

Children dancing in a circle

Nursery rhymes are the wallpaper of childhood memory. They loop in the brain, predictable as a heartbeat. Jack fell down. The clock struck one. But what happens when you take a pair of scissors to that wallpaper?

The Society of Classical Poets offers a challenge that requires a bit of surgical intervention on Mother Goose. The task is not to rewrite a rhyme, but to fracture it. You must take a single line from a nursery rhyme, snap it in two, and use those jagged edges to frame an entirely new creation.

The Mechanics of the Split

The rules are deceptively simple, yet they force a collision between the innocent and the unexpected.

1. Select a line: Choose a well-known line from a nursery rhyme.
2. The Split: Divide it into two halves.
3. The Fill: Use the first half to open your poem and the second half to close it.
4. The Middle: Write original verses in between that change the context, tone, or meaning of the bookends.

It is a form of literary ventriloquism. The old voice starts the sentence; your new voice finishes it.

Examples of the Form

Joe Tessitore, the architect of this challenge, provides two illustrations of how a split line can subvert expectations.

In the first, the pastoral simplicity of “The Farmer in the Dell” is transformed into something more industrial, perhaps even ominous.

“The Farmer in the Dell”

The farmer
Raised a tower for his bell
With tools of power, he built well.
Now on the hour, hear its knell
In field and bower,
In the dell.

In the second example, the most famous lamb in literature meets a darker, comedic fate. The split creates a punchline that lands with the weight of a cast-iron skillet.

“Mary Had a Little Lamb”

Mary had
A dinner party
And her menu, it was hearty.
For the kids, a can of Spam
And for Grandpa,
A little lamb.

Why Attempt the Split?

This exercise does more than test your rhyming ability. It forces you to look at the familiar until it becomes strange. By keeping the shell of the nursery rhyme but gutting the interior, you create a contrast. The sing-song rhythm remains, but the story veers off the rails.

A dinner party serving Spam. A tower tolling a knell. The innocence of the opening line sets a trap that the closing line snaps shut.

Pick a line. Break it. See what grows in the crack.