“Poetry is a creative outlet. It allows words to tumble, even fumble to a timed sequence, or no sequence at all. Most of my poetry is about daily occurrences that I relish and want to share. It is a way to honor a person, place, or natural gift that is around me or in my imagination.”
~by Wendy Reber
A Cheat Sheet I use often:
Iambic Pentameter–a basic rhythm that is pleasing to the ear; an unstressed or short syllable followed by a stressed or long syllable. Syllables in a line=10, two beats per foot, or five (penta) iambic feet. (*Paraphrased from Quora.com) It can be rhymed or unrhymed (blank verse.)
Haiku–Japanese, short form, typically about nature, or an essence, written in three lines with syllables: 5-7-5
Tanka–Japanese 31-syllable poem, traditionally, an unbroken meaning of words written in lines of syllables: 5-7-5-7-7
Cinquain–unrhymed, five-line poem with syllables: 2-4-6-8-2
Tercet–three lines forming a stanza making a complete poem. A Haiku is a Tercet
Nonet– 9 lines starting with 9 syllables, line two has 8 syllables, line three has seven, and so on, down to one syllable on the ninth and last line.
Reverse Nonet– 9 lines starting with one syllable, line two has 2 syllables, and so on, down to line nine with 9 syllables.
Ballad Stanza—Emily Dickinson is famous for writing in the “Yellow Rose of Texas” rhythm. A meter of Protestant hymns has a cadence that can be sung to rhyme.
Sonnet—fourteen lines typically in 10 syllables per line, using any number of rhyme schemes (*Paraphrased from Oxford.com)
Limerick—a humorous and often randy verse of three long and two short lines-five total
Prose—written words as spoken without metrical structure
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