The truth about fibs

22nd January 2021

Jan 22

Substackers!

It has been a while so today, I am going to dive into a form poem called ‘Fibs’ and tell you all about its origins and shiz. If you don't wanna get hella nerdy, that's alright, just scroll down for a wee 3x3 and some others goodies. However, if you are sticking around to ride the nerd train, let's get going!!

Fibonacci

Fibs poetry is a syllable based form poem based on the Fibonacci sequence. Even though the sequence poetry dates back way further, it is named for Leonardo Pisano (1170 - 1250), an Italian mathematician also known as Fibonacci.

The sequence is simple to follow. The syllables in each line are the addition of the two that came before it. It is essentially infinite but let's start with a six-line poem to make it easier to explain. The syllable count goes as follows:

Imagine it starts at zero if you like, 0+1 equals 1, 1+1 equals 2, 2+1 equals 3 and so on and on and on and on. You can continue the sequence by making extra additions. 8+5 to make 13, 8+13 to make 21 etc etc.

If you write one and then centre the text, Fibonacci poetry is nice shape poetry, I'll post an example below and show you:

You can play around with shapes. If you write a normal Fib and then a backwards fib after it, running from the biggest to the smallest syllable count, you get a shape like so:

You could even just write one and then flip is so it looks like a reflection:

The possibilities are endless but the most important part is, you have fun and experiment. Any questions, message me or leave a comment. Also checkout Tinroof poetry for Fibs Friday! Enjoy… Nerds 😉

P.S Savs surname is Phibbs so if I wrote a love poem, it would be called 'A Phibbs poem' am I right?

I have a dozen of these type of poems but this one is one of the dopest because of the design