Tag Archives: iambic pentameter

Spenserian Stanza

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The following description is reposted with permission from The Poets Garret, with thanks to Jem Farmer for her help with that site.

Spenserian Stanza

Edmund Spenser used a distinctive verse form, now known as the Spenserian Stanza in several of his works, most notable is the epic Faerie Queen. The stanza has Nine lines and the main meter is iambic pentameter (10 syllables) over the first eight lines with a final line in iambic hexameter (12 syllables)

Stanza’s Rhyme Scheme: is; a. b. a. b. b. c. b..c. c., and typically has a caesura, or break, after the first three feet

Forth came that auncient Lord and aged Queene,
Arayd in antiquerobes downe to the ground,
And sad habiliments right well beseene;
Anoble crew about them waited round
Of sage and sober Peres, all gravely gownd;
Whom farre before did march a goodly band
Of tall young men, all hable armes to sownd,
But now they laurell braunches bore in hand;
Glad signe of victorie and peace in all their land.

from The Faerie Queene by Edmund Spenser

The form made a comeback in the Romantic period particularly with the poets Shelley and Byron:and it may be noted that Shelley did not stick to IP

Oh weep for Adonais! — The quick Dreams,
The passion-winged Ministers of thought,
Who were his flocks, whom near the living streams
Of his young spirit fed, and whom he taught,
The love which was its music, wander not, —
Wander no more, from kindling brain to brain,
But droop there, whence they sprung; and mourn their lot
Round the cold heart, where, after their sweet pain,
They ne’er will gather strength, or find a home again.

from Adonais, An Elegy on the Death of John Keats by PB Shelley

 

My Example

Form: Spenserian Stanza

Untrained

One takes a mutt mitt when one walks his pup
if walking upon decent city streets.
If pup should poop, you ought to pick it up.
I’ve special gloves made out of plastic sheets;
the awkward ugliness that glove defeats.
I’ve taught my pup to backup to a shrub
where he calmly his nature’s call completes.
It’s seldom that he ever makes a flub.
the glove’s left home; I’m less well-trained, and that’s the rub.

© Lawrencealot – February 25, 2015

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Note: This poet forgot about the suggested caesura after the first three feet, so in that regard this is an atypical stanza.

Novelinee

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The following description is reposted with permission from The Poets Garret, with thanks to Sarah Rayburn.

Novelinee

Created by Sarah Rayburn, the novelinee is a 9 line stanza derived from the Spenserian stanza but written in iambic pentameter or decasyllabic lines. If used as part of a sequence a variation of the closing line should be used as lead line for the next stanza. In the case of a closed novelinee the last stanza would end with a variation of the first line of the first stanza.

Stanza Rhyme Scheme: a. b. a. b. c. d. c..d. d.

 

 

Betrayal of Trust

 

From mists of Avalon she came in white
supernova who split my heart in two
and left untouched silence in endless night
no skyward star to guide my passage through.
While drinking wine I gave my love away
for whispered promises given out of lust,
believing hearts could breathe again today
my dreams now lie amid unwanted dust,
my heart shattered by betrayals of trust.

Sarah Rayburn

 

 

 

Novelinee Sequence

 

Sweet nightingale, unparalleled beauty,
my worldly thoughts will drown in idle words,
if I did not reflect the love I see,
and deny love is nought but food for birds.
I dream my arm is loosely round your waist,
so I shall hear divinity in your song,
and dream upon your eyes with loving haste,
to sip from lips of wine where I belong
and trust the sweetest breath will keep us strong.

With trust the sweetest breath to keep us strong,
my jewel of love to whom I grant my heart,
with words and smiles for days that seem so long,
so fate has cast the miles to keep apart.
In crystal vagaries we’re hand in hand,
whilst waterfalls cascade a rhythmic beat,
as when we kissed upon the golden sand,
below the rugged crags in love’s retreat,
our passion found in nature’s dancing feet.

When passion’s found in nature’s dancing feet,
above the greenest valleys, smile Black hills,
with fragrant flowers dazzling eyes shall meet,
where dragonflies commingle by the rills.
Your heart in truth a loving paradise,
where feelings flow and openly confess,
in daring glances tempting looks of ice,
for you, my love, are more than words express,
I can’t resist your spell of loveliness.

Sarah Rayburn

 

 

 

Motherland ~~~ Closed Novelinee

 

Across the bay where beauty waits for me,
beneath the sun-kissed mountain waterfalls,
enchanting eyes shall tame the wild and free,
my heart is bound by love as Cymru calls.
The cloudy blue of railway smoke dissolved
against the ageing roofing slates of old,
attractions mined before our time evolved,
and children chalked their words in letters bold,
when mountain streams still flowed with yellow gold.

The mountain streams that flowed with yellow gold,
and wrought the wedding bands of royal kings,
still whisper love and tales the bards oft told,
and magic echoes o’er the valleys and springs.
The land where dragons roam and wizards dwell,
where singing voices set our fathers free,
returning home my heart begins to swell,
rejoice my pride in Wales, her mystery,
across the bay her beauty stood by me.

Sarah Rayburn

 

 

My Example

Form: Novelinee

Electric Earth

This century, the twenty-first, will change
forever attitudes that humans share.
Relationships shall surely rearrange
for we’ll have energy at last, to spare.
Our batteries will be charged by the sun
and oilfield ownership won’t mean a hoot.
The politics of greed shall come undone.
We’ll find some other reason for dispute,
but gone will be our reason to pollute.

© Lawrencealot – February 25, 2015

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Curtal Long Hymnal Stanza

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Curtal Long Hymnal Stanza

Type: Structure, Metrical Requirement, Rhyme Scheme Requirement, Stanzaic
Description: A stanzaic form composed of three lines of iambic tetrameter and one of iambic dimeter rhymed abab.
Schematic:
xX xX xX xA
xX xX xX xB
xX xX xX xA
xX xB
Rhythm/Stanza Length: 4

Pasted from http://www.poetrybase.info/forms/000/63.shtml
My Thanks to Charles L. Weatherford for the wonderful PoetryBase resource.

Note: The ONLY difference between this and the Curtal Quatrain is the rhyme scheme.

My Example Poem

My All [Corrected] (Curtal Long Hymal Stanza)

My friends will not critique my verse
they think that they are being kind.
my enemies are even worse
and I don’t mind.

Those folks would shout and jump with glee
and guffaw loudly when I goof
but they ignore me so can’t see
my error’s proof.

I wrote this form with half the count
of syllables required last week.
for feet took double that amount
so thus this tweak.

© Lawrencealot – May 10, 2014

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Curtal Long Hymnal Stanza

Curtal Quatrain

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Curtal Quatrain (French- cut short) is a 19th century American verse form made popular by Archibald Mac Leish. This is not the quatrain used in theCurtal Sonnet of a few of decades before. The sonnet may have influenced the creation of this verse form but the sonnet’s quatrain is 4 lines of iambic pentameter with a trimeter tail added as a 5th line. In the Curtal Quatrain the 4th line is the shorter line.

Curtal Quatrain is:
• stanzaic, written in any number of quatrains.
• metered, primarily iambic. L1, L2, L3 are pentameter and L4 is dimeter.
• rhymed. Rhyme scheme xaxa

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=622#quatrain
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

Fresh Start (Curtal Quatrain)

Some days you rise, intent on making hay
but by the time the coffee’s brewed to taste
the fine aroma announces that it’s
too fresh to waste.

‘Twould be a crime to let it sit and burn,
degrading coffee oils and caffeine too.
It’s best I guess, to postpone things and just
enjoy the brew.

© Lawrencealot – November 24, 2014

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Curtal Quatrain

Bryant

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Viola Berg, in her book Pathways for the Poet 1977, includes invented forms patterned after some works of American poets.

The Bryant describes observations of nature as metaphor for the social and political world around us. This stanzaic form is patterned after To A Water Foul by American poet, William Cullen Bryant 1794- 1878.

The Bryant is:
• stanzaic, written in any # of quatrains
• metered, L1,L4 trimeter and L2,L3 are pentameter. Short lines are indented.
• rhymed, alternating rhymed quatrains, abab cdcd etc
• a pastoral metaphor

A Water Foul by William Cullen Bryant 
Whither, ‘midst falling dew,
While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?
Vainly the fowler’s eye
Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.
Seek’st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean side?
There is a Power whose care
Teaches thy way along that pathless coast,–
The desert and illimitable air,–
Lone wandering, but not lost.
All day thy wings have fann’d
At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere:
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.
And soon that toil shall end,
Soon shalt thou find a summer home, and rest,
And scream among thy fellows; reeds shall bend
Soon o’er thy sheltered nest.
Thou’rt gone, the abyss of heaven
Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart
Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given,
And shall not soon depart.
He, who, from zone to zone,
Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight,
In the long way that I must tread alone,
Will lead my steps aright.

Pasted from <http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=616>
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

Entwined (Bryant)

We followed where you went
oh mighty beast, across this open land.
Our spirits bound to yours and thus content.
In ways we understand.

Because you moved around
impermanence defined our tribe’s motif;
you were revered, your souls and ours were bound
in happiness and grief.

And though we felled your kind
fulfilling nearly all our various needs,
it was with respect only in our mind
for your intrepid breed.

© Lawrencealot – November 19, 2014

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 Bryant

Linked Refrain

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This is a form created my Mary Lou Healy, writing as Mlou on Allpoetry.com.
It is patterned after her own “Autumn’s Imperious Call”.

I’m blown away on the wildling winds of fall.
Almost, it seems, I have no will at all
but melt into those colored dancing streams
that swirl and whirl, painting my leaf-filled dreams.

Painting my leaf-filled dreams with amber light
that glows and goes straight to the heart of things.
This is the season when my hopes take flight
and soar to more ardent heights on burning wings.

On burning wings, my autumn days are borne
into an endless sky.  I must obey
the bright command.  As leaves from trees are torn,
on falling, calling notes,  I’m blown away.

Pasted from http://allpoetry.com/poem/11672061-Autumns-Imperious-Call-by-Mlou

It shares the stanzaic nature and rhyme pattern of the Swap Quatrain but is unique in meter, and by nature of it’s inter-stanza linkage. I have named in the Linked Refrain.

The Linked Refrain is:
Stanzaic: Consisting of 3 or more quatrains
Metered: Iambic Pentameter
Rhymed: aabb cdcd efef, etc
Refrain: The last portion of the last line of each stanza becomes the first part of the next stanza, except for the final stanza. It’s last portion is the first portion of the first stanza.

My example

2nd Amendment to U.S. Constitution (Linked Refrain)

A last resort is revolution, friend,
when tyranny and foul abuse must end.
Dependency sets liberty askew
when laws are slanted by a monied few.

A moneyed few will finally take control
as Tytler showed us, only all too well.*
The point is reached where voting plays no role
and masters then arise we can’t expel.

We can’t expel dictators- we’re but slaves
and will accept a fair amount of pain.
The point will come when men prefer their graves
to bondage. Then of course we’ll fight again.

We’ll fight again; the question is, with what?
We’ll not have laser drones or planes or tanks
nor will the masters use them to rebut
our will for fear of rage within the ranks.

Within the ranks of tyrants in the past
their scheme has been disarm – exterminate!
Won’t we be safer minus guns they asked?
Hell no! The facts are such I’d hesitate.

I’d hesitate for social crime alone,
disarmed against a thief I’d come up short.
I’m keeping every single gun I own
for patriots they are a last resort.

© Lawrencealot – November 3, 2014

* See a brief descripton of the Tytle cycle here:
http: www.commonsensegovernment.com article-03-14-09.html

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Linked Refrain

Tulip

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Pathways for the Poet by  Viola Berg (1977) is a book for and by educators. Classic poetic forms as well as many invented forms which appear to have been invented as teaching tools or exercizes for use in workshops or classrooms are included. Some of these invented forms I have found in use in internet poetry communities, a testament to their staying power. On this page I include the metric invented forms found there in which appear to be exclusive to the community of educators from whom Ms. Berg drew her support. I have yet to find these in any other source… Whether classroom exercise or sharpening your skill as a writer, some of these forms can be fun to play with.

• The Tulip is an invented verse form, a tetrastich with a combination of metric patterns. It was introduced by Viola Gardener.

The Tulip is:
○ a tetrastich, a poem in 4 lines.
○ metric, L1 & L3 are iambic pentameter, L2 i dimeter, a spondee followed by an amphibrach and L4 is dimeter, an iamb followed by an amphibrach.
○ rhymed abab.
○ because of the amphibrach foot at the end of L2 & L4 they have feminine endings.
Starbucks by Judi Van Gorder

The price of java going up and up
Good God! Horrendous!
The cost of coffee is four bucks a cup.
The line, tremendous!

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1199#dionol
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My Example

Another Birthday (Tulip)

I hope you’re happy, laughing and content.
Hail! Years are mounting.
It’s more important how your day is spent
than annual counting.

© Lawrencealot – September 28, 2014

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Tulip

Sestenelle

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Pathways for the Poet by Viola Berg (1977) is a book for and by educators. Classic poetic forms as well as many invented forms which appear to have been invented as teaching tools or exercizes for use in workshops or classrooms are included. Some of these invented forms I have found in use in internet poetry communities, a testament to their staying power. On this page I include the metric invented forms found there in which appear to be exclusive to the community of educators from whom Ms. Berg drew her support. I have yet to find these in any other source. …. Whether classroom exercise or sharpening your skill as a writer, some of these forms can be fun to play with.

• Sestennelle is a stanzaic invented form introduced by Lyra LuVaile with a variable meter.

The Sestenelle is:
○ stanzaic, written in any number of sixains made up of 2 tercets. The original is 3 sixains.
○ metric, iambic, L1&L4 a dimeter, L2&L5 are trimeter and L3&L6 are pentameter.
○ rhymed, rhyme scheme aabccb ddeffe gghiih etc.
○ suggested that the lines be centered.

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1199#dionol
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

In Choosing Well (Sestenelle)

It has been said
a soul may search ahead
and choose themselves the parents who’ll conceive
their earthy form.
There must have been a swarm
of applicants if that’s what you believe.

If such is true
Amera’s baby knew
that boundless warmth and love and gratitude
would come his way
for each and every day
he shared with her; he knew with certitude.

It seem to me,
that through her he shall see
the wonders other children just might miss,
and through his eyes
(this can be no surprise)
his mom will view new realms of earthly bliss.

© Lawrencealot – September 27, 2014

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Sestenelle

Sacred Signia

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Pathways for the Poet by Viola Berg (1977) is a book for and by educators. Classic poetic forms as well as many invented forms which appear to have been invented as teaching tools or exercizes for use in workshops or classrooms are included. Some of these invented forms I have found in use in internet poetry communities, a testament to their staying power. On this page I include the metric invented forms found there in which appear to be exclusive to the community of educators from whom Ms. Berg drew her support. I have yet to find these in any other source. …. Whether classroom exercise or sharpening your skill as a writer, some of these forms can be fun to play with.
• The Sacred Signia is an invented verse form is a decastich. Introduced by Viola Berg.
The Sacred Signia is:
○ a decastich, a poem in 10 lines.
○ metric, L1,L3,L5,L7-L10 are iambic pentameter and L2,L4,L6 are iambic dimeter.
○ rhymed, rhyme scheme ababcbccaa.
Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1199#dionol
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

Her Eyes
Her Eyes (Sacred Signia)

Her eyes compel, intrigue, and they entice.
I feel controlled
at ease, yet seeking solace and advice.
I dare be bold,
when lifted by her steady knowing gaze
There is no cold
within those eyes, they’re warm and quite ablaze –
intelligent and able to appraise.
The magic’s broad and strong and yet, concise,
I need no more to know for sure she’s nice.

© Lawrencealot – September 24, 2014

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Sacred Signia

Rosemary

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Pathways for the Poet by Viola Berg (1977) is a book for and by educators. Classic poetic forms as well as many invented forms which appear to have been invented as teaching tools or exercizes for use in workshops or classrooms are included. Some of these invented forms I have found in use in internet poetry communities, a testament to their staying power. On this page I include the metric invented forms found there in which appear to be exclusive to the community of educators from whom Ms. Berg drew her support. I have yet to find these in any other source. …. Whether classroom exercise or sharpening your skill as a writer, some of these forms can be fun to play with.

• The Rosemary is an invented verse form that uses envelope quatrains. It was introduced by Viola Berg. 

The Rosemary is:
○ a poem in 12 lines, made up of a rhymed couplet, 2 envelope quatrains followed by a rhymed couplet.
○ metric, iambic pentameter.
○ rhymed aabccbdeedff.
○ L4,L5 and L8,L9 are indented.

Pasted from http://www.poetrymagnumopus.com/index.php?showtopic=1199#dionol
My thanks to Judi Van Gorder for years of work on this fine PMO resource.

My example

Specificity

Specificity (Rosemary)

I wandered as I walked and wondered where
I was today, and did I even care??
Like Jack “none” Reacher twixt his many tasks*
My days unfolded just by circumstance
and if you met me it would be by chance.
I seldom answered questions that were asked.
I hitch-hiked here, and don’t know where here is.
I’m somewhere where I’ve never been before,
and glancing see a sign above a door.
It posts the proper answer to the quiz.
The letters, boldly printed make it clear;
they proudly make the point that “You are Here.”

© Lawrencealot – September 22, 2014

*Jack (no middle initial) Reacher is a protagonist in Lee Child novels that I cannot resist.
Photo taken by ea of allpoetry.com

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Rosemary