from: http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/ballad.shtml Poetic Forms: The Ballad by Conrad Geller Traditional poetic forms have had a bad time of it since Walt Whitman set off the free verse revolution about a hundred and fifty years ago. Critics and teachers have learned to sniff at rhyme and rhythm in contemporary poetry as "doggerel," or, worst epithet of all, "greeting-card verse." Too many young poets, mistakenly seizing on the idea that free verse is an art without rules, have been encouraged to reject any form as an encumbrance to the pristine expression of their feelings. Yet the best poets of modern times -- Robert Frost, Richard Wilbur, Dylan Thomas among them -- never abandoned the poetic traditions of English verse. Some of their best work is strictly traditional, and when they turned to the demanding discipline of free verse, they did so with the advantages of a thorough apprenticeship in their craft. If you are a developing poet you, too, might be well advised to look at traditional forms. Even if you end up with free verse, as most contemporary poets do, your time spent playing with the forms of poetry will be a grounding in the discipline of language, which, after all, is the raw material of all poetry: "The right words in the right order." The oldest, in some ways the easiest, and surely the most enduring of all poetic forms is the ballad. Ballads, the main vehicle for stories and songs, go back into the mists of prehistory, before English was even recognizably English: In Scarlet Town, where I was born, "Lie there, lie there, you false young man, Ballads appear all through English literature. Most famous is S. T. Coleridge's The Ancient Mariner: It is an ancient Mariner, An orphan's curse would drag to hell The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew, And all men kill the thing they love, The sun was shining on the sea, ~~~~ from: http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/sonnet.shtml Poetic Forms: The Sonnet by Conrad Geller The sonnet is like the legendary camel which, having put its nose into the tent to keep it warm, soon makes himself at home. Originally an Italian import, it has become the most popular, almost the standard form in English, with thousands of published examples produced by practically every major and minor poet since before Shakespeare. Everyone should write at least one sonnet in a lifetime. Sonnets are fourteen-line poems, period. They exist in every line length, with every rhyme scheme imaginable, or with no rhyme scheme at all. The more or less standard sonnets, however, fall into two types: Italian and Shakepearean. Of these, let's work with the more popular, more elaborate, and at least formally more difficult form. The Italian sonnet was popularized by the Italian poet Petrarch in the fourteenth century, when he wrote a whole bunch of them about his hopeless love for Laura (she seems to have been married). Hopeless lovers have imitated him ever since. Italian, or Petrarchan, sonnets are usually written with a long line of five beats (da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM). They break down into one eight-line stanza, that tells an experience or expresses a thought or feeling, and a six-line stanza, that contrasts with, resolves, or comments on the first part. The eight-line stanza, called an octave, uses two rhyme words. The first line rhymes with the fourth, fifth, and eighth lines; the second with the third, sixth, and seventh. Confused? Here is the octave of a sonnet by the best sonneteer of the twentieth century, Edna St. Vincent Millay: What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why, So now she has expressed her feeling (Loneliness? Regret?) In the six-line finale (the sestet), she is going to make the feeling more vivid still by resorting to a comparison of her situation with that of a tree in winter which, cold and abandoned, seems to have only a faint, nonspecific sense of loss: Thus in the winter stands the lonely tree, Does that seems too hard? I estimate that probably a million sonnets are written nowadays worldwide, by poets young and old, of all possible levels of skill. Why not you? A bigger question is, why bother? Well, you can't know how satisfying, how pleasant, and even how liberating the sonnet can be until you try one. Millay, in a sonnet about writing a sonnet, puts it best, as usual: I will put Chaos into fourteen lines ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ from: http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/triolet.shtml Poetic Forms: The Triolet by Conrad Geller In the Golden Age of lyric poetry, about five hundred years ago, as the French Middle Ages slipped toward the Renaissance, poetic forms tended to become more and more tests of raw skill, like the NBA's Slam-Dunk Contest. A poet needed as many as thirty-six rhyme words for some of the more monstrous concoctions. Compounding the difficulties were the riddles, puns, and acrostics that were supposed to be imbedded in the verses. Most of those poetic types are mercifully only museum pieces now, as more modern poets began to emphasize imagery and feeling over technique. But there is one of those old French forms, the oldest and simplest of them all, that deserves a look from the contemporary poet: the triolet. Going back at least to the thirteenth century, triolets are short, usually witty poems, just perfect for tucking into a box of candy or some flowers. Its name comes from the repetition of the key line three times (French "tri"). A similar form, the rondeau, means "round poem" and also refers to the key feature of repetition (we all know, "Row, row, row your boat", which is still referred to as a "round"). Of the triolet's eight lines, the first line is used three times and the second line is repeated once. So the requirement for rhyme words is easy, and the eight lines really come down to only five different ones--easier than it seems at first. Let's look at an example (Triolets, though very popular during several periods on the Continent, have not abounded in English poetry, so my examples are coming immodestly from my own pen.): It's best to begin a triolet with a statement or observation, something like this: You have to write a triolet To get a form that's fit and set You have to write a triolet From free verse all you ever get Is just another yawn or chortle. You have to write a triolet I loved you, and will love again ~~~~~~~~ from: http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/villanelle.shtml Poetic Forms: The Villanelle by Conrad Geller One traditional form of poetry that can be fun to write, is technically easy compared to the most challenging forms, and often surprises the poet with its twists and discoveries, is the villanelle. Villanelles have been around for at least three hundred years. Its name derives from the Italian villa, or country house, where noblemen went to refresh themselves, perhaps dally with the locals, and imagine that they were back to nature. It seems to have grown out of native songs, with their frequent refrains and complex rhyming. The first thing you need for a villanelle is a pair of rhyming lines that are the heart of your meaning. Here are the two key lines from The House on the Hill, by E. A. Robinson: They are all gone away They are all gone away, Through broken walls and gray Nor is there one today The poem then goes on this way for a total of five three-line stanzas, alternating the two base lines, and ends with a sixth stanza that adds the second line of the stanza one more time: Why is it then we stray There is ruin and decay Beautiful,as the gloomy atmosphere deepens with each repetition. Here is another, much lighter villanelle by a more contemporary poet, Sondra Ball. Her subject is the villanelle itself, and the form is strictly adhered to, though she does allow herself some irregular rhymes: Musical and sweet, the villanelle, flows through the heart, and builds a magic spell It never arcs into the sharp loud yell like a tiny and translucent shell Soft and gentle, tender and so frail, (reprinted by permission Notice, too, that in this form poets can choose longer or shorter lines. Robinson's poem has three beats to a line, while Ball's has the more traditional five (ta-DUM, ta-DUM, ta-DUM, ta-DUM, ta-DUM). This hardy and flexible poetic form has had a resurgence in the last hundred years. Probably the best of the poems produced during this time is Dylan Thomas's reflection on the death of his father, Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night. And for good measure it's probably one of the best poems of the twentieth century of any kind, period: Do not go gentle into that good night, Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight, Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight And you, my father, there on the sad height, Conrad Geller's Series on Poetic Forms: The Ballad - http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/ballad.shtml The Sonnet - http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/sonnet.shtml The Triolet - http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/triolet.shtml The Villanelle - http://www.writing-world.com/poetry/villanelle.shtml Copyright © 2001 Conrad Geller
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