Fixed verse

Fixed verse forms are a kind of template or formula that poetry can be composed in. The opposite of fixed verse is free verse poetry, which by design has little or no pre-established guidelines. The various poetic forms, such as meter, rhyme scheme, and stanzas guide and limit a poet's choices when composing poetry. A fixed verse form combines one or more of these limitations into a larger form. A form usually demands strict adherence to the established guidelines that to some poets may seem stifling, while other poets view the rigid structure as a challenge to be innovative and creative while staying within the guidelines. Haiku A Japanese form designed to be small and concise by limiting the number of lines and the number of syllables in a line. Japanese haiku are three-line poems with the first and the third line having five syllables and the middle having seven syllables. English-language Haiku may be shorter than seventeen syllables, though some poets prefer to keep to the 5-7-5 format. Whitecaps on the bay: A broken signboard banging In the April wind. —Richard Wright (collected in Haiku: This Other World, Arcade Publishing, 1998) Limerick The limerick is an English form, usually humorous and often obscene. It consists of five lines with an AABBA rhyme scheme, the third and fourth lines shorter than the other three. There was an Old Man with a beard, Who said, 'It is just as I feared! Two Owls and a Hen, Four Larks and a Wren, Have all built their nests in my beard!' —Edward Lear Sonnet The sonnet is a European form and at its most basic requires that the total length be fourteen lines. There are two primary forms of the sonnet: English Sonnet In addition to above requirements, the English Sonnet must be four stanzas, the first three being quatrains and the last a couplet. Also the rhyme scheme for the quatrains is ABAB and the final couplet is rhyming. Let me not to the marriage of true minds Admit impediments, love is not love Which alters when it alteration finds, Or bends with the remover to remove.