Falling Short

1…I'm trying to recruit my mate to drabble
2…But he is slow to join our rabble.
3…With a reasonable turn of phrase
4…His story lines amaze.
5…Poetry’s not his strongest lot,
6…A Betjeman or Shelley he is not.
7…Whilst a sonnet has fourteen lines of prose,
8…Drabbles are one hundred words of anything goes.
9…My mate is quite conflicted
10..As he hates to be so restricted.
11..Nevertheless he will give it a whirl
12..Because no one knows what might unfurl.
13..The writing bug can be miraculously caught.
(A sonnet though, this is not, as tantalisingly, it's just one line short.)