Sned-Bairdne: Poetic Forms
Poetic Form Fridays are made to share various poetic forms. This week, we look at the sned-bairdne, an Irish quatrain form.
For this week's poetic form, we're going to look at an Irish quatrain (or four-line stanza) form. Here are the guidelines for writing this one:
- Lines one and three have eight syllables
- Lines two and four have four syllables
- Rhyme scheme: abcb
- End words for each line have two syllables
- The end words for lines one and three consonate with the words in lines two and four
- Every stressed word in line four rhymes
My example below features only one quatrain, but poets can link two or more in one poem if they wish.
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Play with poetic forms!
Poetic forms are fun poetic games, and this digital guide collects more than 100 poetic forms, including more established poetic forms (like sestinas and sonnets) and newer invented forms (like golden shovels and fibs).
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Here's my attempt at an sned-bairdne:
"dragon," by Robert Lee Brewer
The mountains hide a large dragon
in a cavern
according to local legend
at the tavern.
Robert Lee Brewer is Senior Editor of Writer's Digest, which includes managing the content on WritersDigest.com and programming virtual conferences. He's the author of 40 Plot Twist Prompts for Writers: Writing Ideas for Bending Stories in New Directions, The Complete Guide of Poetic Forms: 100+ Poetic Form Definitions and Examples for Poets, Poem-a-Day: 365 Poetry Writing Prompts for a Year of Poeming, and more. Also, he's the editor of Writer's Market, Poet's Market, and Guide to Literary Agents. Follow him on Twitter @robertleebrewer.
