ELEGY gave this round a surprisingly wide emotional range. Some poems used it straight, some used it ironically, and some turned it into a comic afterthought. Debbie compresses an entire day into a glide, a stumble, and a final little lament; Diana makes inheritance itself the punch line; auntie jj expands the prompt into a full comic narrative where the elegy becomes part of the joke rather than the mood.
The linked pieces also show how much room the constraints can gain when they’re allowed to unfold across several poems. Mick’s desert sequence lets OCHER, ELITE, and ELEGY become parts of one seasonal landscape rather than isolated words. And this round introduces a new form to the group: the first solo renga, where a 5–7–5 verse is answered by a 7–7 verse. Instead of simply continuing the image, the second verse shifts it—from fall marigolds in dry wind to horned toads sleeping through winter—which gives the poem a true sense of response.