The Dansa, Balete, Ballata is:
• stanzaic, written most often in 3 quatrains which includes a refrain at the end of each stanza. Occasionally you may find more than 3 stanzas in the poem. The refrain is also added at the beginning of the 1st quatrain, making the 1st stanza a quintain.
• categorized as having no set meter. However during the period from which these verse forms emerged, quantitative or syllabic meters were most often present in the verse of these regions. The dominant Occitan meter was hexasyllabic (6 syllable) lines and the dominant Italian meter was the heptasyllabic (7 syllable) lines with the primary accent on the 6th syllable.
• rhymed, rhyme scheme AbbaA bbaA bbaA
Ballata by Judi Van Gorder
Da di DUM da di DUM DUM DUM
Hear the clacking of flying feet
striking a military beat
The catchy cadence comes up from
da di DUM da di DUM DUM DUM
Open flirting turns up the heat
when good music and dancers meet.
The heart becomes the kettle drum
da di DUM da di DUM DUM DUM
No one will be taking a seat
they slide and step and then repeat
they dance until their toes are numb,
da di DUM da di DUM DUM DUM.
Pasted from <http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=693#balada>
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.
My Example
Thinking Ought be Taught (Ballata)
What’s taught as fact may not be
In modern education,
at least in my own nation.
I’ve dumped much that was taught me.
What’s taught as fact may not be.
The theory of creation
not factoids by quotation
is really what it ought be.
What’s taught as fact may not be.
There should be separation
twixt fact and speculation.
Most students now are thought-free.
What’s taught as fact may not be.
© Lawrencealot – November 13, 2014
Visual template
This template is pattern for iambic meter, though it need not be.
