University Writing Center

The following catalog can guide you in analyzing poetry or in writing your own.

Free Verse

• Is not measured by metrical feet or syllables, but by other patterns such as line patterns, stanza patterns, or patterns of images.
• Is broad in scope and offers much freedom to the poet
• Is popular among contemporary poets

Haiku

• Consists of three lines and seventeen syllables. The first line has five syllables, the second line has seven, and the third line has five syllables.
• Is traditionally about nature, and often a specific season
• Is a short snapshot of a specific moral or lesson
• Often uses imagery to convey emotion
• Sometimes deviates from the traditional 5-7-5 form. It is best to either stick with the traditional form or to be very deliberate in your deviation.

Traditional Forms

• Blank verse: unrhymed words directly related to the natural patterns of English speech. Sometimes this is organized into verse paragraphs to give it some pattern
• Sestina: a French form that does not rhyme, but uses repeating end words in the lines according to a strict pattern. It consists of six, six-line stanzas and a three-line stanza at the end. The style is somewhat artificial and not very popular.
• Villanelle: a French form that is connected by rhyme and is intended to be light in nature. It uses line repetition rather than word repetition and has a specific rhyme structure. It is made up of five tercets and a quatrain and has the following rhyme scheme: aba/aba/aba/aba/aba/abaa. Also, line 1 is repeated in lines 6, 12, and 18; line 3 is repeated in lines 9, 15, and 19. These repeated lines carry weight and meaning.
• Sonnet: The most well known and challenging of all poetic forms. It consists of 14 lines of words directly related to the natural patterns of English speech. There are two main types:
  • Italian Sonnet: consists of two stanzas: an octave which introduces a problem or situation, and a sestet which completes the thought or answers the problem. The rhyme scheme is:
    • Octave: abbaabba
    • Sestet: cdecde OR cdccdc OR cdedce
  • Shakespearian Sonnet: consists of three quatrains and a concluding couplet which provides surprise or irony. It deals with many images but only one complete thought. The rhyme scheme is:
    • Quatrain one: abab
    • Quatrain two: cdcd
    • Quatrain three: efef
    • Couplet: gg

From: Candace Schaefer and Rick Diamond. The Creative Writing Guide. New York: Addison-Wesley Educational Publishers, 1998.

For more information about rhyme schemes and poetic forms, this is a good source to consult.

Further Reading

• http://darkwing.uoregon.edu/~leslieob/pizzaz.html offers creative ways to help with writing poetry and fiction. It also provides a link to a site that allows for online publication of creative writing.
• http://www.fsu.edu/~butler/ Pulitzer prize winner Robert Olen Butler takes you deep inside the process of fictional writing. You can learn, from an expert, how to manifest ideas and write creative stories by drawing from some of the most seemingly simple sources, such as artwork from postcards like Butler uses.
• http://www.teachingcompany.com/sensei/revising.ppt presents effective techniques to improve creative writing, such as advice on sentence-making, word choice, and perspective.
• http://www.homepages.dsu.edu/jankej/Writing/tips.htm – This webpage is from Dakota State University. It focuses on fiction writing and gives information regarding the seven major components of a fiction story.
• http://www.writingclasses.com/ – This site from the Gotham Writers’ Workshop provides a multitude of information on various types of creative writing, including non-fiction, poetry, plays, science fiction, and songs. It also provides information about how to publish your work.

• http://www.unc.edu/depts/wcweb/handouts/poetry-explication.html describes, in great detail, how to explicate a poem. Offers definitions of common poetry terms as well as methods for starting and producing poetry analysis. Links to other writing handouts.
• https://my.hamilton.edu/academics/resource/wc/Writing_About_Poetry.PDF explains how to analyze and interpret poetry by developing a thesis and an argument.
• http://owl.english.purdue.edu/handouts/general/gl_poetry.html – Answers the question many students ask when it comes to writing about poetry: “What’s the Point?” and then follows the answer (a bulleted list) with discussions of theme, genre, versification, figures of speech, and cultural context.
• http://library.thinkquest.org/23846/writing_guide/poetry.html?tqskip1=1&tqtime=0906 provides an easy way to begin the process of analyzing poetry.
• http://writingcenter.tamu.edu/content/view/473/76/ – Uses a series of questions to guide you through the process of analyzing or writing a poem.