Poetry Part 2
Directions:
You must write 6 of these poems (6 different types on topics of your choice).
If there is another type of poem you would like to try, that is not on this list,
just include a definition of the poem type.
Poetry Samples Taken From: http://www.poetrysoup.com/forms_of_poetry/A
1. Acrostic
Name poem to reveal something about yourself.
Example
Elizabeth it is in vain you say
"Love not" — thou sayest it in so sweet a way:
In vain those words from thee or L.E.L.
Zantippe's talents had enforced so well:
Ah! if that language from thy heart arise,
Breath it less gently forth — and veil thine eyes.
Endymion, recollect, when Luna tried
To cure his love — was cured of all beside —
His follie — pride — and passion — for he died.
2. Diamante
The purpose is to go from the subject at the top of the diamond to another totally
different (and sometimes opposite) subject at the bottom. A seven line poem, shaped
like a diamond.
Example
Line
Line
Line
Line
Line
Line
Line
1: Winter = 1 NOUN-A
2: Rainy, cold = 2 ADJECTIVES-A
3: Skiing, skating, sledding = 3 GERUNDS-A (verb + -ing)
4: Mountains, wind, breeze, ocean = 2 NOUNS-A + 2 NOUNS-B
5: Swimming, surfing, scuba diving = 3 GERUNDS-B (verb + -ing)
6: Sunny, hot = 2 ADJECTIVES-B
7: Summer = 1 NOUN-B
Dreams
delightful, wonderful
exciting, daring, fascinating
kings, queens, monsters, giant skittels
raging, horrifying, terrifying
vicious, horrible
nightmares
3. Diminished Hexaverse
A poem containing stanzas of 5 lines, then 4 lines, then 3 lines, then 2 lines, ending with
one word. The syllables in each stanza correspond to the number of lines, i.e. 5 in each
line in the first stanza, 4 in the second stanza and so on. This form may contain more
than five stanzas.
Example
Love, At Last...
If the ground should quake,
If the sky should fall,
If the rain lets up,
If the plants all die,
There is one thing left.
If we lose sight,
If we can't speak,
If the bow breaks,
on the last tree,
we won't cry
or resign,
for we know
there's one
thing left:
love.
4. Epigram
A very short, ironic and witty poem usually written as a brief couplet or quatrain. The
term is derived from the Greek epigramma meaning inscription.
Example
Here lies my wife: here let her lie!
Now she's at rest — and so am I.
— John Dryden
I am His Highness' dog at Kew;
Pray tell me, sir, whose dog are you?
— Alexander Pope
Little strokes
Fell great oaks.
— Benjamin Franklin
5. Epitaph
A commemorative inscription on a tomb or mortuary monument written to praise the
deceased.
Example
AN EPITAPH
Walter de la Mare
Here lies a most beautiful lady,
Light of step and heart was she:
I think she was the most beautiful lady
That ever was in the West Country.
But beauty vanishes; beauty passes;
However rare, rare it be;
And when I crumble who shall remember
This lady of the West Country?
6. Limerick
A limerick is a five-line, often humorous and ribald poem with a strict meter. Lines 1, 2,
and 5 of have seven to ten syllables (three metrical feet) and rhyme with one another.
Lines 3 and 4 have five to seven (two metrical feet) syllables and also rhyme with each
other. The rhyme scheme is usually "A-A-B-B-A".
Example
There once was a man from Nantucket
Who kept all his cash in a bucket.
But his daughter, named Nan,
Ran away with a man
And as for the bucket, Nantucket.
*Other short poems: Haiku, Tanka, Choka, Chingku, Cinquain
7. Pantoum
A rare form of poetry similar to a villanelle. It is composed of a series of quatrains; the
second and fourth lines of each stanza are repeated as the first and third lines of the
next. This pattern continues for any number of stanzas, except for the final stanza,
which differs in the repeating pattern. The first and third lines of the last stanza are
the second and fourth of the penultimate; the first line of the poem is the last line of
the final stanza, and the third line of the first stanza is the second of the final. Ideally,
the meaning of lines shifts when they are repeated although the words remain exactly
the same: this can be done by shifting punctuation, punning, or simply recontextualizing.
Example
In the example, the letters A, B, C etc refer to whole repeated lines, not just rhyming
lines.
a First Line As she dances on the moonlit glen
b Second Line Taking in the freshness of the air
c Third Line She is alone, but not lonely
d Fourth Line She is surrounded by spirits
b Second Line Taking in the freshness of the air
e Fifth Line Searching again for her silent companions
d Fourth Line She is surrounded by spirits
f Sixth Line They watch the contentment she holds
e Fifth Line Searching again for her silent companions
c Third Line She is alone, but not lonely
f Sixth Line They watch the contentment she holds
a First Line As she dances on the moonlit glen
8. Prose Poetry
Prose poetry is usually considered a form of poetry written in prose that breaks some of
the normal rules associated with prose discourse, for heightened imagery or emotional
effect, among other purposes. Arguments continue about whether prose poetry is
actually a form of poetry or a form of prose (or a separate genre altogether). Like
poetry (intense, sculpted) but without line breaks
Example
The Port
------------------------------------------------------------------------------A Port is a delightful place of rest for a soul weary of life's battles. The vastness of
the sky, the mobile architecture of the clouds, the changing coloration of the sea, the
twinkling of the lights, are a prism marvellously fit to amuse the eyes without ever tiring
them. The slender shapes of the ships with their complicated rigging, to which the surge
lends harmonious oscillations, serve to sustain within the soul the taste for rhythm and
beauty. Also, and above all, for the man who of mysterious and aristocratic pleasure in
contemplating, while lying on the belvedere or resting his elbows on the jetty-head, all
these movements of men who are leaving and men who are returning, of those who still
have the strength to will, the desire to travel or to enrich themselves.
--Charles Baudelaire—
9. Sonnet
Lyric poems that are 14 lines that usually have one or more conventional rhyme schemes.
(typical rhyme scheme: aabb ccdd eeff gg)
Example
Into My Own
by Robert Frost
ONE of my wishes is that those dark trees,
So old and firm they scarcely show the breeze,
Were not, as ’twere, the merest mask of gloom,
But stretched away unto the edge of doom.
I should not be withheld but that some day
Into their vastness I should steal away,
Fearless of ever finding open land,
Or highway where the slow wheel pours the sand.
I do not see why I should e’er turn back,
Or those should not set forth upon my track
To overtake me, who should miss me here
And long to know if still I held them dear.
They would not find me changed from him they knew—
Only more sure of all I thought was true.
10. Villanelle
A 19-line poem consisting of five tercets and a final quatrain on two rhymes. The first
and third lines of the first tercet repeat alternately as a refrain closing the succeeding
stanzas and joined as the final couplet of the quatrain.
Example
This is Dylan Thomas' "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night." It is one of the most
famous villanelles and, while Thomas does not experiment much with the form, the poem
is a great example of how villanelle repetition works. The boldface and italics are there
to more easily show the repeated lines and demonstrate the structure of the poem.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
11. Haiku
A traditional Japanese haiku is a three-line poem with seventeen syllables, written in a
5/7/5 syllable count. Often focusing on images from nature, haiku emphasizes simplicity,
intensity, and directness of expression.
Example
wind rain you and me
went looking for a new house
o the grass grows loud