POEMS WITH FIXED STRUCTURES

HAIKU Often have nature as a topic 3 lines By abandoned roads The old pond, aye! And The sound of a frog leaping Into the water. 5 syllables 7 syllables 3 lines Often have nature as a topic By abandoned roads This lonely poet marches Into autumn dusk

LIMERICK Often humorous or light-hearted 5 lines As a beauty I’m not a great star, There are others more handsome by far, But my face I don’t mind it, Because I’m behind it— ‘Tis the folks in the front that I jar. A B 5 lines Often humorous or light-hearted There was a young lady from Niger, Who smiled as she rode on a tiger. They came back from the ride With the lady inside, And the smile on the face of the tiger.

CINQUAIN 5 lines These be Three silent things: The falling snow . . . the hour Before the dawn . . . the mouth of one Just dead. 2 syllables 4 syllables 6 syllables 8 syllables 5 lines Just now Out of the strange Still dusk . . . As strange, as still . . . A white moth flew: why am I grown So cold?

TRIOLET 8 lines Easy is the Triolet, If you really learn to make it! Once a neat refrain you get, Easy is the Triolet. As you see!—I pay my debt With another rhyme. Duece take it, Easy is the Triolet lines 1, 4, and 7 are the same. lines 2 and 8 are the same. 8 lines lines 1,3,4, 5 and 7 rhyme lines 2, 6, and 8 rhyme

Will she kiss me tomorrow? Let it be as it may, Rose kissed me today; But the pleasure gives way To a savor of sorrow; "Birds At Winter“ Around the house the flakes fly faster, And all the berries now are gone From holly and cotoneaster Around the house. The flakes fly! – faster Shutting indoors the crumb-outcaster We used to see upon the lawn Around the house. The Flakes fly faster And all the berries now are gone! Thomas Hardy

I will survive. Although I feel still the pain, I may not smile and I may sigh-- I will stride with my head held high. In the midst of cloud and rain, I may not smile and I may sigh.

SONNET 14 lines 10 syllables/line There is a singer everyone has heard, Loud, a mid-summer and a mid-wood bird, Who makes the solid tree trunks sound again. He says that leaves are old and that for flowers Mid-summer is to spring as one to ten. He says the early petal-fall is past When pear and cherry bloom went down in the showers On sunny days a moment overcast; And comes that other fall we name the fall. He says the highway dust is over all. The bird would cease and be as other birds But that he knows in singing not to sing. The question that he frames in all but words Is what to make of a diminished thing. A B C D E F G

My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips' red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.

No rhyme, but with a set rhythm (syllables/line) = BLANK VERSE No rhyme and no set rhythm = FREE VERSE