Creative writing course week 2

This lesson we learned about some different poetry forms.

The forms that we learned were limerick, villanelle and haiku.
I knew how to do limerick and haiku, but had never heard of villanelle before.

Limerick and haiku are fairly easy, but villanelle is a bit more challenging.

An example of a limerick:

Once, while under the trees (A)
a dear lady sat drinking her teas (A)
out came the host (B)
they had a good toast (B)
but before they had a good squeeze (A)

Written by me.

It has a certain rhythm and rhyme to it.
There are two sets of rhyming couplets as shown and then the last line rhymes with the first two lines. There is also a songlike quality to the way it's read.

Haiku poems are very simple and short.
It is 3 lines long
The first line must use a nature or season word
There has to be one cutting or terminating word at the end of one of the lines
no rhyme or metaphor
The Japanese way of writing Haiku is the 5 - 7 - 5 syllable rule. However it is not necessary to stick to this rule in English Haiku.

Rain uncovers new dirt
heavy black clouds
thirsty plants refreshed

Written by me.

A Villanelle is six stanzas long, each stanza has 3 lines of poetry except for the last stanza. It is based around a rhyming couplet which is worked into the poem in a A B pattern. The last stanza consists of 4 lines with the last two lines being the base rhyming couplet.
There are five tercets (3 lines) and one concluding quatrain (4 lines).

It uses this form:

Refrain 1 (A¹)

Line 2 (b)

Refrain 2 (A²)

Line 4 (a)

Line 5 (b)

Refrain 1 (A¹)

Line 7 (a)

Line 8 (b)

Refrain 2 (A²)

Line 10 (a)

Line 11 (b)

Refrain 1 (A¹)

Line 13 (a)

Line 14 (b)

Refrain 2 (A²)

Line 16 (a)

Line 17 (b)

Refrain 1 (A¹)

Refrain 2 (A²)

An example.

• Edwin Arlington Robinson's villanelle The House on the Hill was first published in The Globe in September 1894.

They are all gone away, (A¹)

The House is shut and still, (b)

There is nothing more to say. (A²)

Through broken walls and gray (a)

The winds blow bleak and shrill. (b)

They are all gone away. (A²)

Nor is there one to-day (a)

To speak them good or ill: (b)

There is nothing more to say. (A²)

Why is it then we stray (a)

Around the sunken sill? (b)

They are all gone away, (A²)

And our poor fancy-play (a)

For them is wasted skill: (b)

There is nothing more to say. (A²)

There is ruin and decay (a)

In the House on the Hill: (b)

They are all gone away, (A¹)

There is nothing more to say. (A²)

Source: wikipedia

I must confess I struggled with this form of poetry as I am not used to structured poetry and rhyming poetry. I write free verse poetry mostly.
However I am finding it to be an interesting style, one I think I will get better at as I learn more.

I have ordered a rhyming dictionary and a phrase thesaurus so that will definitely help me.