Tag Archives: isosyllabic 15

Rustavelian Quatrain or Shairi

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Shairi, or Rustavelian Quatrain
Shota Rustaveli wroteThe Knight in the Panther’s Skin, Georgia’s national epic, towards the end of the twelfth century. It tells of a young prince helping to find a friend’s beloved, who has been captured by devils. Rustaveli used a particularly difficult form for it, known by the Georgian word shairi. 
The recommended rules for English-language shairi are: 4-line stanzas, with all four lines rhyming with one another. The lines are unusually long, having 15 or 16 syllables, and all the rhymes are of either two or three syllables.  
Note for purists
In Georgia, each line of a shairi has exactly 16 syllables, and they recognise two varieties of the form. In a magali (high) shairi stanza the syllables divide 4/4//4/4 (in each of the four lines), whereas in a dabali (low) shairi they divide 5/3//5/3. InThe Knight in the Panther’s Skin (or Vepkhis Tqaosani, if you prefer), Rustaveli alternated magali and dabali stanzas for the entire length of the poem – no fewer than 1576 stanzas. 
© Bob Newman 2004, 2005. All rights reserved.

My thanks to Bob Newman for his wonderful resource above.

Restated specifications:
Stanzaic, quatrains, mono rhyme, multi-syllabic rhyme

 Example Poem
 
 Redirected Feelings     (Rustavelian Quatrain)
 
She faced each day with deep desires- that seemed to her distressing.
Her husband’s morally correct, and counts his wife a blessing 
and’s careful to avoid an act that might call for confessing, 
and sadly that means he won’t watch his pretty wife undressing. 
 
His attitude left her in doubt that her looks were appealing. 
So secretly she bought some clothes- the kind that are revealing, 
then once each week would flash to men the charms she’d been concealing. 
To watch men stare at cleavage bare, aroused in her warm feelings. 
 
She soon could not deny the rush- the moist and warm sensation- 
so weekly outings multiplied; then there was escalation. 
Her exhibition soon became a road to fun flirtation,
a road she knew was but a path, a path to her damnation. 
 
She told herself, “This path is wrong! I’ll stop, what I’m inviting. 
I’ll find a hobby stay at home although that’s less exciting.” 
She switched her gears, and it appears, more people she’s delighting, 
She’s famous now, and satisfied with her erotic writing.
©Lawrencealot – February 28, 2014

Visual Template (15 syllable option)

 

Cinq Trois DecaLa Rhyme

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A Cinq Trois DecaLa Rhyme
15 syllables per line
10 Lines
Rhyme scheme of aabbcccabc
Meter optional.
Formal poetic style by: Laura Lamarca
Example Poem

A Yellow Rose

A yellow rose to me is  like no other, nor can it be.
You told me of your hidden yellow rose before ever we
met and I thought then it something special you and I would share.
We did, and now they must flourish in bouquets and in your hair.
Their yellow brightness calls out exuberant and happy cheer
and their perfume never fails to invoke images of you, dear
While every rose is special, our shared preferance stands out clear.
Of course, it’s only because of you, that much I clearly see,
that yellow was promoted in my mind such that I’m aware
that all is incidental to the fact that your love is here.

(c) Lawrencealot – April 5, 2012

Melodic

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This is a form invented by a poet who writes as  chasingtheday on Allpoetry.com
It is 15 syllables per line and at the beginning of every new line
you rhyme with the last word of the previous line.
The first verse is seven lines,
the second verse is six lines
and third verse is five lines.  (18 lines)
The rhyme for the whole poem is end line rhyme –
Rhyme Scheme: abcabccdefdefghigg
may be perfect rhyme, slant rhyme, or assonance rhyme, or sight rhyme
Each new line beginning must be the same rhyme as the
end line rhyme of the line before it.
The following template may help.  Interpret the rhyme column (a)b as meaning the
first word uses the a-rhyme, the end-word uses the b-rhyme.
Example Poem
Calls for Careful Constant Cogitation   (Melodic)
This form requires lines fifteen syllables long, an internal
Infernal rhyme that’s tough, because adjoining words must rhyme, hence
sense must accrue quickly to pairs that seem spaced so far apart.
Start with a new sentence when you need a break,  an external
nocturnal stimulant, like caffeine or nicotine dispensed
condensed into a pot or a pack may elevate your heart
chart and move your muse.  Or kill you like sex, food, or exercise.
Surprise surreptitiously surfaces when stringing sev’ral
caesural sounds sequentially but may lend a lift and lilt.
Tilt your lance and charge capriciously calling for less control.
Enroll enchanting images of white winged fairies with all
enthralled by fluttering and dancing as if on flower quilt.
Stilt your language if antiquities you’re planning to enroll.
Droll wit can be levered when you have so many words, but wit
lit out from me this week.  I hoped muse and I could together
gather something credible, (not aiming for incredible)–
bull can only be shoveled just so deep.  But muse chose to sit
it out, and left me all alone.  Thus this time will be no hit.
Visual Template