Quintain (poetry)
A quintain or pentastich is any poetic form containing five lines. Examples include the tanka, the cinquain, the quintilla, Shakespeare's Sonnet 99, and the limerick.
Example[]
Sonnet 99, the first stanza:
The forward violet thus did I chide:
Sweet thief, whence didst thou steal thy sweet that smells
If not from my love’s breath? The purple pride
Which on thy soft cheek for complexion dwells,
In my love’s veins thou hast too grossly dyed.
--William Shakespeare[1]
Autumn Song
Know'st thou not at the fall of the leaf
How the heart feels a languid grief
Laid on it for a covering,
And how sleep seems a goodly thing
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf?
And how the swift beat of the brain
Falters because it is in vain,
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf
Knowest thou not? and how the chief
Of joys seems—not to suffer pain?
Know'st thou not at the fall of the leaf
How the soul feels like a dried sheaf
Bound up at length for harvesting,
And how death seems a comely thing
In Autumn at the fall of the leaf?
--Dante Gabriel Rossetti[2]
See also[]
References[]
Further reading[]
- Hobsbaum, Philip (1996). Metre, rhythm and verse form. The new critical idiom. Routledge. pp. 186–188. ISBN 0-415-08797-X.
External links[]
- The Poet's Garret webpage. List and description of five-line poetry forms
- Stanzaic form
- Poetic form