Writing a fictional prophecy

[ToniPain]

I am currently writing my first fanfic, and am struggling to write the prophecy I want to include. I have a basic outline of what I want it to include but can't seen to get it to flow the way I want it to. 

If anyone has done anything like this before or think you may be able to help, please let me know and I will post what ideas I have so far.
Thank you

 

[daniel_gudman]

Well, there's a List of fulfilled prophecies on wikipedia because of course there is, but really, you gotta aim for the classics, to wit, the Oracle of Delphi, who was famously ambiguous.

Most famously, Croesus of Lydia was advised over pursuing his campaign against Persia: "if you cross the river, a great empire will fall." He ended up losing; it was his empire that fell.

So, a good prophecy (in a narrative sense) has a lot in common with a joke; there's a solid setup, but then some action happens and there's an unexpected twist, like a punchline, that shows there was another way to interpret the statement all along.

If you want, like, pure structural arguments, then most Greek poetry was written in hexameter, whereas English poetry tends to be in pentameter, especially the iambic formulation. So a couple poetic lines can really make give a prophecy that lyricalism, and it pushes it towards the kind of circular, nonspecific construction that works best anyways.

 

[ToniPain]

Thank you Daniel, I do want it to read poetically, and maybe slightly cryptic. It's been bugging me for days but I shall keep at it and look in to what you have suggested.