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Ballad
Chain rhyme
Clerihew
Kyrielle
Lai (or virelai)
Limerick
Ode
Ottava Rima
Pantoum
Rhyme Royal
Rondel
Rondeau
10 line rondeau
Rondelet
Roundel
Chaucerian Roundel
Rubai
Sapphic
Sestina
Sicilian Octave
Sonnets
English Sonnet
Spencer's Sonnet
Italian Sonnet
Miltonic Sonnet
Spenserian
Syllabic verse
Haiku
Tanka
Naga-Uta
Terza Rima
Triolet
Venus and Adonis
Villanelle
This is a quatrain
(4 lines) where the first and third lines have four feet, and the second and
fourth lines three feet with lines 2 and 4 rhyming.
Carries over the rhyme from one stanza to the next
in regular form (as in terza rima) giving
a-b-a, b-c-b,
c-d-c, d-e-d, e-f-e, f-f or
a-a-b-a, b-b-c-b,
c-c-d-c, d-d-a-d
This is a humorous quatrain, rhymed
as two couplets, with lines of uneven length. It is typically short
and pithy and about a person (i.e. quasi-biographical). The name of
the subject usually makes up the first line.
Form derived from
the liturgy and characterised by frequent repetition of one particular
line. This is usually written in couplets arranged in quatrains with
the refrain in the second line of the couplet or the fourth line of
the quatrain.
Commonly, but not
exclusively, used in hymns, the refrain may be a whole line or a
single word. Usually in iambic tetrameter, the rhyme scheme would be
a-A, a-A for couplets or for quatrains, a-a-b-B, c-c-b-B or a-b-a-B,
c-b-c-B
Composed of units
of 3 lines, a rhymed pentameter couplet (2 lines of 5 feet) followed
by a dimeter (2 feet), grouped together into stanzas. The dimeters
within a stanza must rhyme with each other.
The stanza may be
of any length so long as it is made up of multiples of three lines
arranged as above and with all the pentameters in any verse rhyming,
and the poem may contain any number of stanzas.
Virelai ancien is a variation of the
above but with interlocking rhymes giving
a-a-b-a-a-b, b-b-c-b-b-c,
c-c-a-c-c-a.
This is a humorous 5 lined verse
rhymed a-a-b-b-a in which the first, second and last lines are
trimeters (an iamb plus two anapaests) while the third and fourth
lines contain 2 anapaests.
The last word of the first line is
typically the name of a person or a place and the last word of the
last line often a pun on that name.
This is a largely
unstructured form made up of successive groups of three stanzas.
Originally unrhyming (being Greek), modern poets now usually apply a
rhyme pattern, but the stanza may be of any type, with the only
stipulation being that the whole is made up of repetitions of the form
of the first three stanzas.
The Horatian ode
is made up of a succession of stanzas following the pattern of the
first.
Keats, in his ‘Ode
to a nightingale’ invented a 10 line form in iambic pentameter except
for the eighth line which is iambic trimeter, and a rhyme scheme
a-b-a-b, c-d-e, c-d-e.
This is an octave
(8 lines) rhyming a-b-a-b-a-b-c-c and is a longer version of the
Venus
and Adonis below.
This is a verse
form of Malay origin written in interlocked eight syllable quatrains
(4 lines) usually rhyming a-b-a-b in which the second and fourth lines
of each stanza become the first and third lines of the next. The form
is completed with the unrepeated first and third lines of the first
stanza reversed as the second and fourth lines of the last. Thus, the
poem begins and ends with the same line.
To work, a pantoum
may only have two rhyme schemes (i.e. a and b) and must have an odd
number of stanzas.
This is an iambic
pentameter septet (7 lines of 5 feet) rhyming a-b-a-b-b-c-c
This contains 14
lines with two rhymes and a two line refrain repeated 3 times in lines
1 & 2, 7 & 8, and 13 & 14 giving
A-B-b-a-a-b-A-B a-b-b-a-A-B
or
A-B-a-b-b-a-A-B
a-b-a-b-A-B
A 13 line rondel
is permissible with the last line being either A or B
This has 15 lines
with three uneven stanzas and a refrain ending the second and third
stanzas. The refrain is a word or phrase from the beginning of the
first line.
a-a-b-b-a, a-a-b-R, a-a-b-b-a-R
This has 2 stanzas
each ending in a one word refrain which is the first word of the
poem. The refrain is not included in the line count as it is only one
word giving
a-b-b-a-a-b-R,
a-b-b-a-R
This has 7 lines
with the first line, typically an iambic dimeter (2 feet) but in any
case shorter than the others, repeated as lines three and seven and
the remaining lines iambic tetrameter (4 feet) giving A-b-A-a-b-b-A
Each stanza has 11
lines with the first part of the first line repeated as a refrain in
the fourth and eleventh lines. The refrain may rhyme but this is not
required, giving
a-b-a-B, b-a-b, a-b-a-B
or
a-b-a-R, b-a-b,
a-b-a-R
This has 10 lines,
2 tercets (3 lines) and a quatrain (4 lines), with the first line
repeated at the end of the second and third stanzas giving A-b-b,
a-b-A, a-b-b-A
This is an Iambic
pentameter quatrain (4 lines of 5 feet) rhyming a-a-b-a, b-b-c-b, etc.
This is an
unrhymed quatrain (4 lines) where the first three lines are trochaic
pentameter (5 feet), but with the third foot a dactyl, and the 4th
line two feet, a dactyl and a trochee
This has six
stanzas of six unrhymed lines, followed by a three-line envoi or
refrain. Instead of rhyme, the sestina uses word repetition.
The end word of
each line of the first stanza is repeated in different order as the
end word in each of the following stanzas and the envoi. The end word
of the last line of each stanza should be the end word of the first
line of the next, creating a chain.
The envoi should
be made up of 6 half lines, each ending in the first verse end words
2,5,4,3 and 6,1 respectively.
Traditionally the
end words were meant to have a feminine ending.
A rhymed sestina
should have a rhyme scheme of a-b-a-b-a-b, b-a-b-a-b-a, etc. This
avoids overuse of rhymed couplets.
This is an octave
rhyming a-b-a-b-a-b-a-b
Also known as the
Shakespearean sonnet, this has 14 lines, 3 quatrains (4 lines) and a
couplet (2 lines) rhyming a-b-a-b, c-d-c-d, e-f-e-f, g-g. The three
quatrains should develop a thought, with each leading to the next, and
the couplet throwing them powerfully into context.
This is an adapted
form of the English sonnet but with an interlocking rhyme scheme
a-b-a-b, b-c-b-c, c-d-c-d, e-e.
This has 14 lines
of iambic pentameter (5 feet) comprising an octave (8 lines) and a
sestet (6 lines) rhyming respectively a-b-b-a, a-b-b-a and c-d-e,
c-d-e or c-d-c, d-c-d.
This is an adapted
form of Italian sonnet without the fixed break after line 8. Milton
would put his break anywhere it suited him in the eighth or ninth
lines.
This has 9 lines
rhyming a-b-a-b-b-c-b-c-c. The first 8 lines are iambic pentameter (5
feet) and the ninth an iambic hexameter (6 feet) (also known as an
alexandrine).
This is 3 lines
totalling 17 syllables arranged 5, 7, 5. It has neither rhyme nor
metre and usually concerns itself with time, a memory, or a season so
that it captures a moment. This should use alliteration wherever
possible.
This has 5 lines
with 31 syllables and is a Haiku plus 2 additional 7-syllable lines.
This has alternate
5 and 7 syllable lines of which there may be any number plus a final
extra 7 syllables.
This is an iambic
pentameter triplet (3 lines of 5 feet) rhyming a-b-a, b-c-b, c-d-c,
etc.
This has 8 lines
with the first two repeated as the last two and the first line also
line four as in A-B-a-A-a-b-A-B. The repeated lines should be
identical in sound if not in meaning, often containing puns.
This is an iambic
pentameter (or shorter) sestet (6 lines of 5 feet or less) rhyming
a-b-a-b-c-c and is a shorter version of ottava rima
above.
This has 19 lines comprising five tercets (3 lines)
and a quatrain (4 lines). The first and third lines of the first
tercet recur alternately at the end of each subsequent tercet and both
together at the end of the quatrain giving
A1-b-A2, a-b-A1,
a-b-A2, a-b-A1, a-b-A2, a-b-A1-A2
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