In the literary genre of lyric poetry there are various poems, also poems, which have similar characteristics. Such poem forms are distinguished by the fact that there are certain guidelines for how such a poem has to be designed. For example, the length, that is, the number of lines and stanzas, as well as the measure or the rhyme scheme, can be fixed. Furthermore, there are collective names, which may include different types of poems, which then have the same thematic reference. The following is an overview.
Akrostichon A text that is based on the fact that the initial letters, first syllables, or words of successive verse lines, or even verses, form a sense unit or independent sentence. Can in principle also occur in other genres, but is mostly found in songs or poems.
Ballad Is a type of poem that has no fixed metric shape, but usually has three to six stanzas. These strophes then usually follow the same meter and are frequently rhymed. As a rule, the verses have at most six verses and consist of at least three lines.
The essential feature of the ballad is that it forms a hybrid of the literary genres: it contains both epic (the narrative of a story), lyrical (formally a poem), and dramatic (monologues, dialogues) elements.
Chant royal A special form of the French ballad. It is composed of five eleven-line verses, often consisting of ten-syllable verses, which usually follow the scheme ababccddede and are rounded off by a closing verse. This follows the pattern ddede. All stanzas end with the same verse. Only five different rhymes are used, but they always use a different rhyming word. The chant royal was often allegorical.
Drápa is an Old Norse song, also a song of praise, which singles individual persons or whole tribes and stanzas. The individual verses are based on the strictest form of the old Norse scandinavian poetry: the Dróttkvætt measure. Consists of initiation, middle and conclusion. The middle section is characterized by sweepers. This poem was widely used in the 9th to 13th centuries.
Elegy Only in original form as a separate poem form. Then think of a poem that is written exclusively in distichs. As a distichon a couple, which is formed from a hexameter and a pentameter, is designated. Later the elegy was regarded as the epitome of poems.
Elf consists of five verses. The first verse consists of a noun; the second describes this with two words more precisely; the third line consists of three words which indicate what the noun does; the fourth line shows a general thought on the subject, the last verse is a summary of the poem.
Epigram Originally a short inscription on tombs, buildings and gifts. From this developed a separate poem form. The epigram usually consisted of distals (a hexameter and a pentameter).
Characteristic is the shortness of the poem, since this usually has no more than four lines. It is either a kind of meaning poem, so it gives a pointed thought and aptly a thought, or is written as a mocking poem and mocks a person, group or instance.
gloss
(glosa) Above all, the term means a journalistic text. The word also denotes a Spanish poem, which was imitated above all in German Romanticism. The gloss usually deals with a philosophical or erotic content. It has four verses, each ten verses following the rhyme scheme of the decime (abba / ac / cddc).
Haiku is a traditional Japanese poem form. This consists of three groups of words (verses) with five, seven and five lute units (these are called mores). In German the lute units are often interpreted in syllables.
However, the haiku is usually implemented freely, which is why many haiku have less than 17 syllables. The first line of the Haikus usually names a concrete fact, often a season, and has a direct relation to the present, that is, to the here and now.
Hymn This type of poem has no fixed form, which is why it is mostly translated into free verse. The hymn is the festive praise, often a divinity is sung. Nevertheless, there are examples that sing localities or people. Stylistically, therefore, she resembles the Ode. In the course of the apotheosis of a person (deification of mortals) hymns are often used.
Kanzone Is a mixture of song and ode, serving the serious as well as melancholy consideration of a fact. It consists of a number of longer, but equally constructed verses, with a shorter closing verse forming the conclusion.
In Mid-High German, a canteen consisted of three parts, which were designated as studs. The first two lugs were identical on the basis of the external features and were designated as “Aufgesang”, but the last part, the “Abgesang”, differed. Metrically the studs were the same.
Concrete Poetry Counts in the actual not to the different poem forms, but is a certain kind of poems to write. In this case, the language no longer serves the description of a thing, but is used for the representation itself. Thus the noun apple could always be repeated in a work, whereby by the arrangement of the words itself it looks like a two-dimensional apple.
Teaching poem The form of the poem, which was mainly used in the Middle Ages and the ancient world. The teaching poem is usually moral and has an instructive character and can cover all areas of knowledge. Very often it consists exclusively of hexameters, although there are also examples, which are formed from distributions (hexameters and pentameters). Number of verses and verses are not fixed here.
Song A poem form, which is strophisch and is characterized by a simple Volkston. The rhyme scheme is usually continuous, with the verses being rather short. Often, the sequence of the verses is interrupted by a recurring word sequence (refrain).
Limerick Actually, a nonsense verse, which, however, usually stands alone and thus is perceived as an independent poem. Is humorous, ironic, partly grotesque and always ends on a nonsensical end line. In most cases it consists of five Anapaese verses with 3, 3, 2, 2, 3 lifts and the rhyme schema aabba.
Madrigal In the literature, the madrigal refers to a poem of Italian lyricism of the 14th century. As a rule, the poem consists of two or three punches with three double verses and a subsequent chorus of two verses which rhyme in pairs.
Ode Oden are poems that praise something. They are divided into stanzas, but do not show a fixed rhyme scheme. In ancient times Oden followed mostly certain odestrophes, which had a predetermined structure (Alkaean, Sapphian or Asclepadeic Odenstrophe).
Prospericht Means a kind of text between prose and poem. Prospericht is an artistically structured and rhythmically-sounded prose, which differs from lyric in that the final rhymes are missing and the speech is not bound by verses. A prosperity is, however, not only very rhythmic, but also powerful, which is why it is heavily influenced by lyrical stylistic elements, such as assonances, internal rhymes, etc.
Rondell Belongs to the poem forms, which are mostly absent, and usually encompasses eight lines. There are two different types of the Rondell, but both have in common that they play with repeating individual elements.
In the first variant, each line consists of a short but complete sentence or a completed sentence part, which is supplemented by a subsidiary sentence in the second line. The sentence from the first verse is repeated in lines 4 and 7. The second line is repeated in the last verse. The lines 3, 5 and 6 are further additions or reinforce the main theme.
In the second common variant of the Rondell, the lines need not include complete sentences or sentence units. It is sufficient if the sentence is complete in the next sentence. In this case, not the first, but the second line in line 4 and line 7 are repeated. Further repetitions are not a must.
Sestine This poem consists of six verses, each of which is characterized by six jambic lines. The essential feature of Sestine is to keep the rhyming words of the first stanza in a fixed order. If the verses of the first stanza are numbered from 1 to 6, the second stanza is 612345, the third is 561234, the fourth is 456123, the fifth is 345612, and the sixth is 234561.
Sonnet is a fourteen-line poem consisting of two four-line and two three-line verses. The quartets are called the quartets and the three-string terzets. Characteristic is the use of alternating (alternating uplift and lowering) gauges, usually using the jamb. The rhyme scheme varies. Typical is a hugging rhyme in the quartet, where the triads usually follow the pattern cdc / dcd, cde / cde and ccd / eed.
Vilanelle Originally a simple peasant and pastoral. Later, however, it was formed into the following poem: no fixed number of verses, usually four, which often have 8 verses consisting of seven or eleven syllables. The rhyme scheme usually follows the pattern abababcc, thus resembling the punch. The pair cc was often repeated as a sweepstripe.
Note: Poems such as elf, acrostic, limerick or haiku have specific prescriptions, but they are only a single stanza (single verse). This is why they are often counted not to the poem forms, but to the stanza forms. However, they are often treated as a separate poem form.