Discover poem types. From Abecedarian to Madrigal to Zéjel.
Start here: Poem Types’ Overview
Barzelletta was a popular verse form utilized by Italian frottola composers, intended to entertain audiences with wit and rhythm, that has only rarely been applied to poetry outside of music. It is a subgenre of the frottola, a type of music that preceded the madrigal as a popular form of Italian secular music.
An anagrammatic poem is a poem in which every line or section of the poem is an anagram of all lines or sections of the same length. Anagrammatic poems are extremely uncommon due to their difficulty. They represent an interesting mixture of puzzles and poems.
An ars poetica poem examines the poet’s role as a subject himself, what his or her relationship is to the poem and the reasons behind writing the poem. Ars Poetica poems represent a declaration of the writer’s beliefs about poetry.
A dramatic monologue is a poem that is in the form of a speech. It tends to be “dramatic” because of its theatrical feature. Dramatic monologues are used by poets to express a point of view through the words of a solitary character.
Contrapuntal poems utilize a combination of multiple poems to create one larger composition that attempts to be more than the sum of its parts. While they are comprised of two or more distinct poems, contrapuntal poetry is done by clever formatting and writing so that they “converse” with each other.
An inaugural poem is a subtype of occasional poetry. It’s read during an inauguration of a new president. Only three American presidents have poets read an inaugural poem at their inaugurations thus far. Kennedy, Clinton, and Obama were leaders known to be appreciative of literature.
Monostich poems are single-line poems. By looking at the prefix “mono” (meaning single, one, only) we can quickly tell this poem is a one-liner. Due to its length, some scholars debate on whether monostich poetry should even be considered a true poem or not.
Occasional poems are written to describe a certain occasion or event. These poems are typically intended for public reading or performance. Because occasional poetry is originally intended as a performance, they are often lyric or written with a particular rhyme, meter, or sound repetition.
The bop is a poem form that was developed by Afaa Michael Weaver during a poetry summer retreat at Cave Canem. Bop poems are made up of three stanzas, where each stanza is followed by a refrain. This poetic form is argumentative in nature whereby the author presents a problem, talks about it, and then offers a potential solution.
A ghazal poem is an ancient ode form of poetry that traces its roots to 7th-century Arabia. The ghazal is usually made up of 5 to 15 independent yet linked couplets. Ghazal poems are often expressions of the pain of separation, loss, and one-sided love.
An abecedarian poem is another form of an acrostic poem. Abecedarian poems consist of verses wherein the first letter of each line is a letter of the alphabet in succession. Abecedarian poetry traces back its roots to as early as the biblical period. Thus, the earliest forms of abecedarian poems can be found in the Hebrew Bible.
A patchwork poem is a form of found poetry made of lines taken from different sources, and when assembled together they create an entirely new poem. Patchwork and cento are actually words used interchangeably when referring to this poem type. It’s just that patchwork poetry is essentially seen as the “modern” version.
Aubade poems are “daybreak” love songs that welcome the new morning but also lament the end of the night. Thus, it is typically about lovers parting at dawn. The earliest forms of aubade originated in France in the 12th century. It is actually an adaptation of the Old Occitan lyric poetry alba, which means sunrise.
Chance operations are poem generation techniques that basically leave the compositional operation to “chance”, such as the rolling of a dice, or tossing of a coin. Poems that are created by using chance operations typically source texts from famous written literary works, magazines, and even newspaper articles.
A renga is a Japanese collaborative genre of poetry, in which multiple poets alternately contribute stanzas to the poem. The renga came into existence after two people started writing a tanka (a traditional short Japanese poem) together, and it became a favorite pastime even in ancient rural Japan.
The Rondeau is a fixed poem type of French origin. It is composed of 15 lines that are divided into three stanzas namely, a quintet, a quatrain, and a sestet. The first and the last lines of a rondeau are identical and it follows the aabba aabR aabbaR rhyme scheme.