POETRY GENRES AND FORMS

I MIGHT FEEL A BIT VILLANELLEOUS TODAY, BUT PERHAPS THROUGH A PSALM I WILL PRAY

To better remember,

for more creativity,

the following of forms is suggested,

when writing poetry.

(1)

INTRODUCTION

Poetry is an art of its own as we have established. It is a great wonder and an amazing way to convey one's deepest thoughts and emotions. It is also a great way to deliver messages or even teach.

Poetry predates written language and remained the go-to method even after writing systems were developed and put in place. It was after all the easier way to remember things, especially if the poems follow a certain form. Also, they tend to spark creativity and give to the poem rhythm and sound.

A DIVERSE FIELD

Let’s face it. For the most part, we all love the comfortable and the familiar things. We most certainly tend to steer away from diversity, at least in the majority parts of life. While I believe in being willing to make bold steps outside your comfort zone when led to do so, there is wisdom to be found in proper boundaries too. Poetry and poets can profit from this too.

Poetry can be divided into different styles/types according to forms and genres. Today we will take a quick look into them.

POETIC FORMS AND GENRES

Poetic forms refer to the structures that hold or give shape to poems. (https://hcmc.uvic.ca/project/closereading/form.html) It speaks of elements such as stanzas, rhyme, rhythm, and meter to name a few, and the pattern in which they are used.

Forms are very useful for three reasons:

they make poetry easier to remember

they shape the rhythm and sound of a poem

they challenge our use of language: through creative limitation they make us instinctively look for ever more creative and imaginative ways to use the limited space that we’re given (2)

Based on which elements and their number the poem is built from, we can divide poetry into different poetic forms:

1. SONNET

A short poem with 14 lines of 10 or 11 syllables each and a regular rhyming pattern according to the scheme. The Italian sonnet consists of an octave and a sestet, the English sonnet on the other hand consists of three quatrains and ends with a rhyming couplet. (3)

2. SHI

Shi is the main type of Classical Chinese poetry characterized by "folk song" styled verse (yuefu), "old style" verse (gushi), and "modern style" verse (jintishi). In all cases, rhyming is obligatory. (3)

3. VILLANELLE

Villanelle is a 19-line poem with two rhymes and two refrain lines, in the form AJoA 2abAj abA2 abA¡ abA2 abA¡ A2, where capital letters indicate refrains. (3)

4. LIMERICK

A limerick is a poem consisting of five lines often of a humorous nature. (4)

5. TANKA

Tanka is an unrhymed form of Japanese poetry, with five sections totaling 31 ons (phonological units identical to morae), structured in a 5–7–5–7–7 pattern. (4)

6. HAIKU

The most popular form of unrhymed Japanese poetry. It is written in a single vertical line and contains three sections totaling 17 on (morae), structured in a 5–7–5 pattern. (4)

7. KHLONG

Khlong is among the oldest Thai poetic forms. It requires tone markings of certain syllables. They must be marked with mai ek or mai tho. Among them is khlong si suphap as the most common form still currently employed. (4)

8. ODE

Ode is a lyric poem, a fairly long one, with lines of different lengths and complex rhythms. It is addressed to a particular person or thing. (3)

9. GHAZAL

The ghazal is a form of poetry common in Arabic, Bengali, Persian, and Urdu. In classic form, it has from five to fifteen rhyming couplets that share a refrain at the end of the second line, which may be of one or several syllables and is preceded by a rhyme. Each line has an identical meter and is of the same length. Usually the theme is unattainable love or divinity. (4)

10. BALLAD

A ballad is a short, narrative poem usually relating to a single, dramatic event. (3)

11. BLANK VERSE

Blank verse is a verse that is unrhymed, and composed of lines that normally contain ten syllables and have stress on every second syllable, as in the classical iambic pentameter. (3)

12. FREE VERSE

Free verse is poetry without metrical form. (3)

13. RONDEAU

Rondeau is a poem of 13 or sometimes 10 lines with only two rhymes. The first line is used as a refrain after the eighth and thirteenth lines. (3)

14. SESTINA

A sestina is composed of six stanzas of six lines each. They are followed by an envoi (q.v.) of three lines, all of which are unrhymed. (3)

15. TRIOLET

A French fixed form composed of eight lines and using only two rhymes, disposed in the following scheme: ABaAabAB. (3)

16. CLERIHEW

They are a little bit like limericks in that they’re short, funny, and often satirical. (2)

17. CINQUAIN

A cinquain is a five-line poem consisting of twenty-two syllables: two in the first line, then four, then six, then eight, and then two syllables again in the last line. (2)

18. DIZAIN

A dizain is a traditional form made up of just one ten-line stanza. Each line has ten syllables (that’s an even hundred in total). The rhyme scheme is ABABBCCDCD. (2)

19. PARADELLE

The paradelle is a complex and demanding variation of the villanelle. A paradelle is composed of four six-line stanzas. In each of the first three stanzas, the first two lines must be the same, the second two lines must be the same, and the final two lines must contain every word from the first and third lines, and only those words, rearranged in a new order. The fourth and final stanza must contain every word from the fifth and sixth lines of the first three stanzas, and only those words, again rearranged in a new order. (2)

20. RONDEL

A rondel is a French type of poetry made of three stanzas. The first two are four lines long and refrains. They are repeated as the last two lines of the following two stanzas. The third stanza is five or six lines long. Usually an ABBA ABAB ABBAA rhyme scheme is used, but they can be written in any meter. (2)

21. GOLDEN SHOVEL

It is a bit like an acrostic-style poem with secret messages. The last word of every line of a Golden Shovel poem is a word from another poem’s title or line, or a saying or headline you want to work with. (2)

22. PALINDROME

Palindrome poems, also called “mirror poems,” are poems that begin repeating backward halfway through, so that the first line and the last line are the same. (2)

23. EKPHRASIS

It is a bit like an Ode and usually written about paintings. (2)

24. PASTORAL

Pastoral poetry focuses on nature and romanticize the idea of shepherds and agriculture laborers living in harmony with the natural world. (2)

25. ACROSTIC

In acrostic poems, certain letters of each line spell out a word or message. Usually the letters that spell the message will be the first letter of each line. (2)

26. FOUND POETRY

Found poetry is a poem made up of a composite of external quotations. (2)

27. NONCE

A nonce poem is a DIY poem structure intended for one-time use to challenge yourself as a writer. (2)

POETRY GENRES

Forms define the way a poem arranges sounds, rhythms, or its appearance on the page. Genres on the other hand are like the poem's style. (5) Or put differently they are a tradition or classification of poetry based on the subject matter, style, or other broader literary characteristics. (4)

Here is a list of some of them:

1. NARRATIVE POETRY

It is a genre of poetry that tells a story (4).

2. LYRIC POETRY

Lyric poetry is poetry of a more personal nature (4).

3. EPIC POETRY

Epic poetry is poetry defined as lengthy poems concerning events of a heroic or important nature to the culture of the time. (4)

4. SATIRICAL POETRY

Poetry revolving around satire.

5. ELEGY

An elegy is a mournful, melancholy, or plaintive poem, especially a lament for the dead or a funeral song. (4)

6. VERSE FABLE

The fable is an ancient literary genre, often set in verse. It is a succinct story nd features anthropomorphised animals, legendary creatures, plants, inanimate objects, or forces of nature that illustrate a moral lesson. (4)

7. DRAMATIC POETRY

Dramatic poetry is drama written in verse to be spoken or sung. (4)

8. SPECULATIVE POETRY

Also known as fantastic poetry, a genre that deals thematically with subjects "beyond reality" (4)

9. PROSE POETRY

Prose poetry is a hybrid genre that shows attributes of both prose and poetry. (4)

10. LIGHT POETRY

Also known as light verse, attempts to be humorous. (4)

11. SLAM POETRY

Slam poetry Is a genre where slam performers comment emotively, aloud before an audience, on personal, social, or other matters. (4)

12. PERFORMANCE POETRY

Performance poetry fuses a variety of disciplines in a performance of a text, such as dance, music, and other aspects of performance art. (4)

13. LANGUAGE HAPPENINGS

They are events that focus less on poetry as a prescriptive literary genre, and more on descriptive linguistic acts and performance, often incorporating broader forms of performance art while poetry is read or created at that moment. (4)

14. COMPUTER POETRY

Known also as e-poetry, digital poetry, new-media poetry, hypertext poetry, and computer poetry. It denotes combinatory texts automatically generated from the formal rules and logic of a computer program. (3)

15. CONCRETE POETRY

Poetry which conveys meaning through the physical arrangement of the words on the page as well as through the words themselves. (3)

16. PSALMS

Psalms are religious lyric poetry. (6)

CONCLUSION

Poetry is a form of art in itself and is such a diverse field of art. There are a wide variety of different poems out there based on form and genre ranging from free verse, epics, ballads, computer poetry and even more. Feel free to explore poetry and give different genres and forms a go. They say you grow as a writter if you do so.

SOURCES

1. Image created via canva.com.

2. Fija Callaghan. Types of Poetry: The Complete Guide with 28 Examples. Available at https://www.scribophile.com/academy/types-of-poetry#why-do-the-different-forms-of-poetry-matter

3. Oakton College. Poetry. Available at https://researchguides.oakton.edu/c.php?g=1313792&p=9658612

4. Wikipedia. Poetry. Available at https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Poetry#Forms

5. Harvard University. Poetry at Harward. Glossary of poetic genres. Available at https://poetry.harvard.edu/glossary-poetic-genres

6. Bob McCabe. The Poetic Nature of the Psalms. Detroit Baptist Theological Seminary. 10 July 2012. Available at https://dbts.edu/2012/07/10/the-poetic-nature-of-the-psalms/

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Until next time!