Couplets are any two lines working as a unit, whether they comprise a single stanza or are part of a larger stanza. Most couplets rhyme (aa), but they do not have to. There are several set forms of the couplet and a myriad of variations based on line length and meter. All of the following rhyme "aa":
* Short Couplet- iambic or trochaic tetrameter. From Maxine Kumin's "Morning Swim"
Into my empty head there come
a cotton beach, a dock where from
I set out, oily and nude
through mist in oily solitude.
* Split Couplet- the first line in iambic pentameter, the second in iambic dimeter. From Richard Steere's "On a Sea-Storm Nigh the Coast"
The weighty seas are rolled from the deeps
In mighty heaps,
And from the rocks' foundations do arise
To kiss the skies.
* Heroic Couplet- two lines of iambic pentameter, also the last two lines of the English sonnet. From Richard Steere's "On a Sea-Storm Nigh the Coast"
Wave after wave in hills each other crowds,
As if the deeps resolved to storm the clouds.
* Alexandrine Couplet- an alexandrine is a line of iambic hexameter, so an alexandrine couplet is two rhymed lines of such. These often come at the end of stanzas or poems and, in these cases, are also called codas.
* Qasida- an Arabic form consisting of any number of lines all rhyming on the same rhyme.
How To You can do almost anything with a couplet. They can stand as single thoughts, meaning they can exist on their own, outside of the poem, or they can be enjambed, relying on the previous and succeeding couplets to be complete. Most open form couplets are written this way, and a rhyme scheme should play no bearing on how couplets are or are not interlocked.
The couplet can be a very lonely stanza, minimalistic. Poems whose content is melancholy or depressing, for example, can make good use of the couplet because--on the page--there is a lot of white space, emptiness, as opposed to writing in quatrains where the stanzas are blocks which limit the white space. As well, because the couplet can be so small, it is a good idea to pack it full of image and emotion, like a hard punch packed in a tight space, very concentrated. If the power in a couplet is not contained to the couplet, then you have a quatrain or something larger. This doesn't mean the idea and emotion cannot flow between or through couplets, I am only suggesting that each couplet be a powerful, emotionally-intensive unit to the whole.
-- Damon McLaughlin
Poem types and structures- Examples
Way
Day
So
Go
Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;
My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy:
Seven years thou wert lent to me, and I thee pay,
Exacted by thy fate, on the just day.
The Above is a rhyming couplet
______________________________________________________________________
Time
Stay
Way
Lime
An omnibus across the bridge
Crawls like a yellow butterfly,
And, here and there, a passer-by
Shows like a little restless midge.
Big barges full of yellow hay
Are moored against the shadowy wharf,
And like a yellow silken scarf,
The thick fog hangs along the quay.
The yellow leaves begin to fade
And flutter from the Temple elms,
And at my feet the pale green Thames
Lies like a rod of rippled jade.
A simile is a comparison between unlike objects using the words "like" or "as."
Lines 7 and 8, "And, like a yellow silken scarf, / The thick fog hangs along the quay," provide a good example of a simile. A metaphor is more than a comparison; it equates one object or idea with another. Charles Simic's statement, "Poetry is an orphan of silence," is an example of metaphor. Hyperbole is language characterized by extreme exaggeration ("I could eat a horse."). Personification is a literary technique used to endow inanimate or inhuman objects with human traits. "The wind whistled a tune" would be an example of personification.
Examples
# Suspicion climbed all over her face, like a kitten, but not so playfully —Raymond Chandler
# Love is like the devil; whom it has in its clutches it surrounds with flames —Honoré de Balzac
# Exuding good will like a mortician's convention in a plague year —Daniel Berrigan
# Guiltless forever, like a tree —Robert Browning
# Idle as a painted ship upon a painted ocean —Samuel Taylor Coleridge
# As good as gold —Charles Dickens
The above is a simile
____________________________________________________________________
Tercets are any three lines of poetry, whether as a stanza or as a poem, rhymed or unrhymed, metered or unmetered. The haiku is a tercet poem.
* Haiku- a Japanese, three-line form generally about nature and the seasons or which incorporates such related imagery. It is based also on a syllable count of 5-7-5 per line, though that is not a strict rule. This is an example from Basho, one of the most famous Japanese haikuists, from "Fourteen Haiku:"
I would lie down drunk
on a bed of stone covored
with soft pinks blooming.
*
How to Haiku: The haiku relies on image to provide everything else a poem should. Inside the image lies spirit, emotion, and idea, and these are released when the image is isolated (for lack of better word) from the rest of the world. The image itself is what is important becuase it is supposed to evoke a response in our senses that is both cerebral and physical. Whether or not this is always achievable is a good question. It seems to me that a good haiku is nothing more than a moment of Zen wherein everything is evoked, and nothing is evoked, if that makes any sense at all.
Some other common tercets are:
* Enclosed tercet- a triplet that rhymes "aba". If the three lines are written in iambic pentameter, then they are called a sicilian tercet. This is just a silly, normal tercet:
I am a yellow dog
who wishes he was
a purple-spotted frog.
* Terza Rima- this form is created by interlocking any number of enclosed triplet stanzas, meaning the first and third lines of a stanza rhyme, and the middle line rhymes with the first and third lines of the following stanza like this "aba bcb cdc ded" and so on.
I am a yellow dog
who would rather be
a toad. Too many frogs
have ideas about the sea,
foreign swamps and bayous,
my own puddle makes me happy . . .
* Villanelle- a tough form. It uses triplets for most of the poem, and that is why it is included under Tercets, but you won't find anything about it here.
* Terzanelle- see Villanelle
How To
If your writing a poem that is made up entirely of tercets, then they should behave in the same manner as a poem made up of couplets, evocative and somewhat self-contained. If not (perhaps you're writing a sonnet), then the tercet becomes a cog in a wheel, necessary to the functioning of the poem.
-- Damon McLaughlin
a set or group of three lines of verse rhyming together or connected by rhyme with an adjacent tercet.
The above is a rhyming tercet
Sonnets were first written in Italian and were traditionally love poems. Though the sonnet is a form that can be experimented with, it has remained true to its original length of fourteen lines and its Anglicized meter of iambic pentameter. Petrarch developed the sonnet to one of its highest levels during early Renaisannce Italy, but it wasn't translated into English until the sixteenth century. From there, Shakespeare made the sonnet famous in England and others followed his lead.
The sonnet can be thematically divided into two sections: the first presents the theme, raises an issue or doubt, and the second part answers the question, resolves the problem, or drives home the poem's point. This change in the poem is called the turn and helps move forward the emotional action of the poem quickly, as fourteen lines can become too short too fast.
Most sonnets are one of two kinds:
* Italian (Petrarchan)- this sonnet is split into two parts, an octave and a sestet. The octave is composed of two envelope quatrains rhyming "abba abba" (Italian octave). The sestet's rhyme pattern varies, though it is most often either "cde cde" (Italian sestet) or "cdc dcd" (Sicilian sestet). The turn occurs at the end of the octave and is developed and closed in the sestet. Over the years, the Italian sonnet has been the most favored type of sonnet. Donald Justice- "Sonnet: The Poet at Seven"
And on the porch, across the upturned chair,
The boy would spread a dingy counterpane
Against the length and majesty of the rain,
And on all fours crawl under it like a bear
To lick his wounds in secret, in his lair;
And afterwards, in the windy yard again,
One hand cocked back, release his paper plane
Frail as a mayfly to the faithless air.
And summer evenings he would whirl around
Faster and faster till the drunken ground
Rose up to meet him; sometimes he would squat
Among the bent weeds of the vacant lot,
Waiting for dusk and someone dear to come
And whip him down the street, but gently home.
Notice the turn at line 9, "And summer evenings . . ." and how it develops and closes the poem by the last line. Justice changed the form a bit, rhyming the sestet "ccd dee," or viewed as couplets "cc dd ee."
* English (Shakespearian)- this contains 3 Sicilian quatrains and one heroic couplet at the end, with an "abab cdcd efef gg" rhyme scheme. The turn comes at or near line 13, making the ending couplet quick and dramatic. Not many modern writers have taken to writing the Shakesperean sonnet. e. e. cummings, not known to the general public for sonnet writing, supplies us with a Shakespearean sonnet example:
)when what hugs stopping earth than silent is
more silent than more than much more is or
total sun oceaning than any this
tear jumping from each most least eye of star
and without was if minus and shall be
immeasurable happenless unnow
shuts more than open could that every tree
or than all his life more death begins to grow
end's ending then these dolls of joy and grief
these recent memories of future dream
these perhaps who have lost their shadows if
which did not do the losing spectres mine
until out of merely not nothing comes
only one snowflake(and we speak our names
#
Here are two other almost common sonnet types:
* Spenserian- this sonnet is very similar to the Shakespearian sonnet in form, though its rhyme scheme is slightly different. It is written with 3 Sicilian quatrains and an ending heroic couplet. It rhymes "abab bcbc cdcd ee", such that the rhyme scheme interlocks each of the quatrains, much like the terza rima is made of interlocking triplets.
* Envelope sonnet- this is made with two envelope quatrains and a sestet: "abba cddc efgefg (efefef)". It is almost exactly like the Italian sonnet except the quatrains use different rhymes (notice both quatrains in the Italian rhyme "abba").
How To
If you have a grip on blank verse and can write a couplet, tercet, and quatrain, then the sonnet--either kind--will come easy to you. Both types are composed in three parts, so the sonnet can be simplified, in a way, by being broken down. It's like making an outline. The turn, I find, usually takes care of itself somehow, and the more the writer worries about it, the more difficult it will be to reach. As with any poem of any kind, let the structure guide you, not vise versa. If you allow the feel and movement of the sonnet to take the poem to the next line, the turn will happen and the sonnet will be well on its way to being complete.
A sonnet can be helpful when writing about emotions that are difficult to articulate. It is a short poem, so there is only so much room to work in. As well, the turn forces the poet to express what may not be normally expressible. Hopefully, you'll find yourself saying things you didn't know you were going to say, didn't know you could say, but that give your a better understanding of the emotions that drive the writing of the poem.
Online Examples and Resources:
a poem of fourteen lines using any of a number of formal rhyme schemes, in English typically having ten syllables per line.
The above is a sonnet
Blank Verse is any verse comprised of nonrhymed lines all in the same meter, usually iambic pentameter. It was developed in Italy and became widely used during the Renaissance because it resembled classical, nonrhymed poetry. Marlowe's "mighty line," which demonstrated blank verse's range and flexibility, made blank verse the standard for many English writers, including both Shakespeare and Milton, and it remained a very practiced form up until the twentieth century when Modernism rebelled and openly experimented with the tradition. Regardless, blank verse was embraced by Yeats, Pound, Frost, and Stevens who skillfully brought the tradition through this century. While it may not be as common as open form, it retains an important role in the world of poetry.
Blank verse can be composed in any meter and with any amount of feet per line (any line length), though the iamb is generally the predominant foot. Along with the iamb are 3 other standard feet and a number of variations that can be employed in a blank verse poem. It is difficult--almost impossible--to write a blank verse poem consisting of all iambs, and other types of feet get used more often than one may think. These are:
1. Iamb- two syllables, unstressed-stressed, as in "today".
2. Trochee- two syllables, stressed-unstressed, as in "standard".
3. Anapest- three syllables, unstressed-unstressed-stressed, as in "disengage"
4. Dactyl- three syllables, stressed-unstressed-unstressed, as in "probably".
Variations include:
1. Headless Iamb or Tailess Trochee- one stressed syllable. Labeling the foot depends on where it is located in the line.
2. Spondee- two stressed syllables, as in "hot dog"
3. Amphibrach- three syllables, unstressed-stressed-unstressed, as in "forgetful"
4. Double Iamb- four sylalbles, unstressed-unstressed-stressed-stressed, as in "will you eat it?" A double iamb is counted as two feet.
Blank verse can be written with any combination of the above feet. The name of the dominant foot coupled with the number of feet in the line provide the name of a poem's meter. For example, the dominant foot in Robert Frost's "Mending Wall" is the iamb, and there are five feet per line. Thus, the poem is written in iambic pentameter. Notice, however, that not each foot is an iamb, but Frost mixes up the feet, as in the first few lines of the poem.
Something there is that doesn't love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun
When you read the words, the natural rhythm is not de-dum, de-dum, de-dum--it is not strictly iambic. The first line, for example, scans as a trochee and four iambs. Scansion, by the way is how poets demonstrate the meter of a poem using accents to show the stressed syllables. With scanning, one can tell if a poem is metered or not and, if so, what kind of meter is present, as in "Mending Wall:"
Sómething there ís that dóesn't lóve a wáll.
Of course, how a person scans a single line or an entire poem depends on the reader's natural rhythms and inclinations, and, while there may be better ways to scan a poem, there is not always a single correct scan. In the first line of "Mending Wall", for instance, the first iamb could be read as a trochee, with the stress falling on "there" instead of "is."
How to and Examples
One way to write in blank verse is to take an old poem and turn the existing lines into ten-syllable lines. Then, modify the diction and the syntax (be careful not Yoda always try to sound) in such a way that the iamb becomes the predominant foot. Remember, the poem should be read naturally without forcing the meter onto the rhythm. Each line does not need to read "de-dum, de-dum, de-dum, de-dum, de-dum" but, rather, that that meter can be over-imposed onto the natural rhythm of the line. As well, the poem should be read in sentences, not by line break. Line breaks should be determined by the meter. Allow the meter of the poem to drive you as you write it. Let it decide where the line length and line breaks should be without imposing your own natural habits.
This can be very difficult to do if you have never tried writing blank verse before, and I have found the above method does not work best for me. A second way is to simply write in pentameter by using roughly ten syllable lines, then, going back and changing syntax and diction to emphasize the iamb. With a little practice the meter will soon be controlling the way the line moves and sounds, and it will modify your natural rhytms to adhere with the pattern.
What does blank verse do to the line? It lengthens it, of course, but the meter also pushes the line into the next line and so on, giving blank verse a strong, narrative pull. I find blank verse makes my own poems long winded, the meter drives me to keep writing, and I feel a narrative voice emerging that I don't feel in a shorter-lined poem. Blank verse can be very helpful in that way, particularly if you feel you don't know what to write. The meter and long line demand words to fulfill its requirements, which makes blank verse a decent exercise for escaping writer's block.
Examples of blank verse include:
* "Mending Wall"- Robert Frost (almost anything by Frost will be a solid example)
Online Examples and Resources:
verse without rhyme, esp. that which uses iambic pentameter.
The above is a blank verse
* Haiku- a Japanese, three-line form generally about nature and the seasons or which incorporates such related imagery. It is based also on a syllable count of 5-7-5 per line, though that is not a strict rule. This is an example from Basho, one of the most famous Japanese haikuists, from "Fourteen Haiku:"
I would lie down drunk
on a bed of stone covered
with soft pinks blooming.
The Shiki Internet Haiku Salon
How to Haiku: The haiku relies on image to provide everything else a poem should. Inside the image lies spirit, emotion, and idea, and these are released when the image is isolated (for lack of better word) from the rest of the world. The image itself is what is important becuase it is supposed to evoke a response in our senses that is both cerebral and physical. Whether or not this is always achievable is a good question. It seems to me that a good haiku is nothing more than a moment of Zen wherein everything is evoked, and nothing is evoked, if that makes any sense at all.
Some other common tercets are:
* Enclosed tercet- a triplet that rhymes "aba". If the three lines are written in iambic pentameter, then they are called a sicilian tercet. This is just a silly, normal tercet:
I am a yellow dog
who wishes he was
a purple-spotted frog.
* Terza Rima- this form is created by interlocking any number of enclosed triplet stanzas, meaning the first and third lines of a stanza rhyme, and the middle line rhymes with the first and third lines of the following stanza like this "aba bcb cdc ded" and so on.
I am a yellow dog
who would rather be
a toad. Too many frogs
have ideas about the sea,
foreign swamps and bayous,
my own puddle makes me happy . . .
* Villanelle- a tough form. It uses triplets for most of the poem, and that is why it is included under Tercets, but you won't find anything about it here.
* Terzanelle- see Villanelle
How To
If your writing a poem that is made up entirely of tercets, then they should behave in the same manner as a poem made up of couplets, evocative and somewhat self-contained. If not (perhaps you're writing a sonnet), then the tercet becomes a cog in a wheel, necessary to the functioning of the poem.
-- Damon McLaughlin
Japanese poem of seventeen syllables, in three lines of five, seven, and five, traditionally evoking images of the natural world.
The above is a haiku
When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer
When I heard the learn'd astronomer,
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me,
When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,
When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,
Till rising and gliding out I wander'd off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look'd up in perfect silence at the stars.
Un this there is no rhyme
Rather than employing rhyme or meter, Whitman uses natural speech rhythms to endow his poetry with musicality. A sonnet is a 14-line poem of iambic pentameter, usually broken into an octave and a sestet or three quatrains and a couplet. A haiku is a Japanese poem of only three lines; the first and third lines of a haiku have five syllables while the second line has seven. Terza rima consists of tercets written in iambic pentameter with an interlocking rhyme scheme.
The above is a free verse
an arrangement of triplets, esp. in iambs, that rhyme aba bcb cdc, etc., as in Dante's Divine Comedy.
The above is a terza rima
"A litany of little linnets alighted on the lamppost"
The repetition of the "L" sound at the beginning of several words in this sentence indicates alliteration. Consonance is also a repetition of consonant sounds, but the consonant repeated appears at the end of words, rather than at the beginning. Dissonance is the mingling of harsh, inharmonious sounds that are grating to the ear. To the contrary, the alliteration used in this example creates a pleasant, rhythmic sound. A refrain is a phrase or line, generally important to a poem's topic, that is repeated word for word at regular intervals throughout the poem.
Alliteration is a stylistic device, or literary technique, in which successive words (more strictly, stressed syllables) begin with the same consonant sound or letter. Alliteration is a frequent tool in poetry but it is also common in prose, particularly to highlight short phrases. Especially in poetry, it contributes to euphony of the passage, lending it a musical air. It may act to humorous effect. Related to alliteration are assonance, the repetition of vowel sounds, and consonance, the repetition of consonant sounds.
Examples
* "Full in the passage of the vale, above, / A sable, silent, solemn forest stood;" James Thomson, The Castle of Indolence, Canto I, 37-38
* "I should hear him fly with the high fields / And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land." Dylan Thomas, Fern Hill, II 50-51
* "Weia! Waga! Woge, du Welle, walle zur Wiege! Wagala weia! / Wallala weiala weia!" Richard Wagner
* "Sing a song of sixpence..." Nursery rhyme
* "The furrow followed free.." Samuel Taylor Coleridge , The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner , Part II , Para 4 , Line 2
The above is a alliteration
the recurrence of similar sounds, esp. consonants, in close proximity
Consonance is a stylistic device, often used in poetry. It is the repetition of consonant sounds in a short sequence of words, for example, the "t" sound in "Is it blunt and flat?" Alliteration differs from consonance insofar as alliteration requires the repeated consonant sound to be at the beginning of each word. In half rhyme, the terminal consonant sound is repeated. A special species of consonance is using a series of sibilant sounds (/s/ and /sh/ for example); this is sometimes known simply as sibilance.
The above is a consonance
The little town and river grew as one
And played as children on the valley floor
In stormy weather if they scrapped for fun
This only made them like each other more
Each line of the excerpt is written in iambic pentameter: five iambs per line. An iamb is a metrical foot of two syllables; the first syllable is unstressed and the second syllable is stressed. The only answer choice also written in iambic pentameter is B.
The above is a iambic pentameter
He followed her to school
Which was against the rule
He took her away
Which was against the rule
He married her so young
Which was against the rule
A refrain is a repeated line or number of lines in a poem or song, typically at the end of each verse.
The above is a refrain
‘not agreeing in sound,’ from the verb dissonare.
Dissonance has several meanings, all related to conflict or incongruity.
In music, dissonance is a property of an interval or chord. See consonance and dissonance.
In poetry, dissonances is the deliberate avoidance of patterns of repeated vowel sounds (see assonance). In general, words that are difficult to pronounce or contain harsh, rasping consonants are considered dissonant. Dissonance in poetry is similar to cacophony and the opposite of euphony.
Cognitive dissonance is a state of mental conflict.
The above is a dissonance
Sestina tends to have a scary ring to it, and I imagine many fall back with a look of fright at the mere sound of the word. We all have, it's all right. A little pactice and the sestina can be a very rewarding exercise for any poet looking for a challenge.
The sestina is yet another fun, French form, and it is divided into 6 sestets (six line stanzas) and 1 triplet called an envoi which is just a concluding stanza that is half the size of the rest. Unless you wish to make the sestina harder than it already may be, it is usually unrhymed and works by repeating the end words of each line. The envoi contains, in any order, all of the six end-words. The catch is that one has to be buried in each line and another must be at the end of the line. The pattern for repeating the words is like this: (stanza A) 123456, (stanza B) 615243. This 615243 pattern is how each of the "next" stanzas are made. The first way to learn this pattern is to look at a sestina. "Sestina d'Inverno" by Anthony Hecht:
Here in this bleak city of Rochester,
Where there are twenty-seven words for "snow,"
Not all of them polite, the wayward mind
Basks in some Yucatan of its own making,
Some coppery, sleek lagoon, or cinnamon island
Alive with lemon tints and burnished natives,
And O that we were there. But here the natives
Of this grey, sunless city of Rochester
Have sown whole mines of salt about their land
(Bare ruined Carthage that it is) while snow
Comes down as if The Flood were in the making.
Yet on that ocean Marvell called the mind
An ark sets forth which is itself the mind,
Bound for some pungent green, some shore whose natives
Blend coriander, cayenne, mint in making
Roasts that would gladden the Earl of Rochester
With sinfulness, and melt a polar snow.
It might be well to remember that an island
Was blessed heaven once, more than an island,
The grand, utopian dream of a noble mind.
In that kind climate the mere thought of snow
Was but a wedding cake; the youthful natives,
Unable to conceive of Rochester,
Made love, and were acrobatic in the making.
Dream as we may, there is far more to making
Do than some wistful reverie of an island,
Especially now when hope lies with the Rochester
Gas and Electric Co., which doesn't mind
Such profitable weather, while the natives
Sink, like Pompeians, under a world of snow.
The one thing indisputable here is snow,
The single verity of heaven's making,
Deeply indifferent to the dreams of the natives,
And the torn hoarding-posters of some island.
Under our igloo skies the frozen mind
Holds to one truth: it is grey, and called Rochester.
No island fantasy survives Rochester,
Where to the natives destiny is snow
That is neither to our mind nor of our making.
After reading this, you can feel the obsession that underlies the sestina. The repetition of those ends words can crawl under your skin, not with the hit-over-the-head bluntness of a villanelle, but with a sneaking, growing strength that is more subtle.
How to and Examples
One way of writing a sestina is to choose your 6 end words before you even begin the poem. Say, for instance, "book," "town," "pumpkins," "watch," "potatoes," and "sling." These are your 6 words in order of stanza one. Write a sestina. I find it's very difficult to get a good poem with this method, but it does force the poet to be creative, depending on the difficulties and relations of the pre-chosen words.
A second way is to just write a sestet and go from there, using each of the end words from that stanza. This is my preferred method because I like not knowing, initially, where I'll break the line, so my first stanza is written according to line break and enjambment, not word choice with a sestina in mind.
From there, the sestina is free to experimentation. The end words can be modified, say "leaf" to "leave" or "love" or "life" to give the initial word more dimension. It may be harder to keep the exact same word through all 7 stanzas, but sometimes the poem asks for a different word, actually improving the poem rather than taking away. As well, I find
a good exercise is to set a line-length limit based on the lines from the first stanza. The sestina line is generally longer, and as you can see in the Hecht poem, the lengths are also erratic: some stick way out on the page, others are stuck deeper inside the poem. If a poem is going to be rather block in form (as the sestina is), I prefer to have the lines be at a similar length for appearance's sake; I think that just looks better on the page. As well, this method also forces the poet to use crisp, concise details in the poem because there is only so much room in every line to get to the word at the end. Every word must be chosen accurately, and in this way the poet's powers of diction improve.
The above is Sestina
Quatrains are four line stanzas of any kind, rhymed, metered, or otherwise. Like the couplet, there are many variations of the quatrain. Some of the more popular as passed through tradition are:
* Alternating Quatrain- a four line stanza rhyming "abab." From W.H. Auden's "Leap Before You Look"
The sense of danger must not disappear:
The way is certainly both short and steep,
However gradual it looks from here;
Look if you like, but you will have to leap.
* Envelope Stanza- a quatrain with the rhyme scheme "abba", such that lines 2 and 3 are enclosed between the rhymes of lines 1 and 4. Two of these stanzas make up the Italian Octave used in the Italian sonnet. This is from Auden's "Look Before You Leap"
The worried efforts of the busy heap,
The dirt, the imprecision, and the beer
Produce a few smart wisecracks every year;
Laugh if you can, but you will have to leap.
* In Memoriam Stanza- this form was used by Tennyson in his poem "In Memoriam" and is an envelope stanza written in iambic tetrameter (four feet). From "In Memoriam"
O thou, new-year, delaying long,
Delayest the sorrow in my blood,
That longs to burst a frozen bud
And flood a fresher throat with song
* Redondilla- this is a Spanish form written in tetrameter with any of three rhyme schemes: "abba", "abab" or "aabb".
* Italian Quatrain- this is an envelope stanza written in iambic pentameter. Doubled (eight lines), it becomes an Italian Octave and the first half of the Italian Sonnet.
* Sicilian Quatrain- this is iambic pentameter that rhymes "abab", from the English Sonnet. Like the Italian Quatrain, it is a form of the Heroic Stanza because it is written in iambic pentameter.
* Hymnal Stanza- this is an alternating quatrain that is written in iambics. Lines 1 and 3 are iambic tetrameter, and lines 2 and 4 are iambic trimeter. It is also a form of the Common Measure which rhymes abcb instead of abab as in the hymnal. From Robert Burns' "A Red, Red Rose"
O, my love's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June:
O, my love's like the melody
That's sweetly played in tune.
The alternating meter often makes one or the other more pronounced, in a way pulling the poem along. For this reason, the hymal stanza can be a good catalyst for a narrative voiced poem.
* Pantoum- this Malayan form is a struggle for any poet. Good luck. The pantoum is made with any number of alternating quatrains with lines of any length and meter. The catch is that lines 2 and 4 of each stanza become lines 1 and 3 of the succeeding stanza. They are to be repeated in their entirety (if possible) which is what makes the pantoum such a frustration and pain. Each stanza, then, becomes interlocked with the stanza above and below it by rhyme and line, giving the poem a unique feel not unlike that of a villanelle: obsessive and tedious. And to make matters worse, the pantoum's last stanza takes lines 1 and 3 of the first stanza and uses them as either lines 1 and 2, or 2 and 4, but in reversed order. The pattern looks like this:
Stanza 1: A1 B1 A2 B2
Stanza 2: B1 C1 B2 C2
Stanza3 : C1 D1 C2 D2
Stanza 4: D1 or A2 Also sometimes a A2 or A1 couplet of A2 A1.D2 or D1 A1 or D2
Though you can use as many number of stanzas you wish, four for the above pattern was just arbitrary number. This is "The Eunuch Cat" by Lewis Turco:
She went to work until she grew too old,
Came home at night to feed the eunuch cat
That kept the mat warm and its eyeballs cold.
She walked, but ran to wrinkles, then to fat,
Came home at night to feed the eunuch cat,
Then went to bed, slept dreamlessly till eight,
And waked. She ran to wrinkles, then to fat.
She fixed her supper, snacked till it was late,
Then went to bed, slept dreamlessly till eight--
Must I go on? She'll feed the cat no more.
She fixed her supper, snacked till it was late,
Then died at dawn, just halfway through a snore.
Must I go on?--she'll feed the cat no more
To keep the mat warm and its eyeballs cold.
She died at dawn, just halfway through a snore;
She went to work until she grew too old.
How To Pantoum
I find the pantoum can get too repetitious for my liking, escpecially if it's written with fairly short lines because the repeated lines cycle faster. The repeated lines should elicit a definite emotional reaction in the reader, but they are not intended to necessarily agitate. An easy way to avoid the whole agitation business is to think about the pantoum line in terms of caesura and enjambent. If a sentence ends in the middle of a line, then the natural pause and emphasis that comes at the end of the sentence can be lessened. This way the line becomes enjambed and the reader naturally follows to the next line. When lines are continually end stopped, the repetons can seem overly repeated. If you want certain lines to receive greater attention, then, perhaps end stop them. If you want the line to be read more on the casual, natural side, then use enjambent. I try to vary the enjambents in my own pantoums, as variety is an effective way of keeping the poem fresh.
It is near impossible to repeat the repetons in their entirety, and I can't honestly say I've run across many that do. This is okay. Oftentimes you can rearrange a few words to put a little spice in the line, or add or subtract a word here and there. The pantoum can become acoustically overbearing, and slight varieties in line can help shrink that feeling.
Also, don't worry too much about what word to end each line on, or what vowel sound you want to rhyme the sound on, these worries will only get in your way. Let the poem decide what word comes next and where it fits in the line. The pantoum is a demanding form, and no poet needs to add any extra vices to the structure. Have fun, it only gets easier.
The above is Quatrain
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