11 Types of Poetry to Explore

Hey fellow writers!

Welcome to Poetry Month! 🎉

Throughout April, we’ll be focusing on different types of poems to inspire your creative journey. Whether you're a seasoned poet or just starting out, exploring the many forms of poetry will help you find your unique voice.

Poetry is a vast and diverse literary form that allows writers to express emotions, stories, and ideas in unique ways. From structured forms to free-flowing verse, poetry offers something for everyone. Today, we’re exploring 11 common types of poetry, their structures, and examples to inspire your own writing.

1. Acrostic

In an acrostic poem, the first letter of each line spells out a word.

Example:

Perfect tool for writing on the fly

Evolution from quills to fountains, ballpoints to rollerballs

No touchscreen or keyboard can replicate the satisfaction of writing by hand

2. Ballad

A narrative poem with a musical quality, usually written in quatrains with a rhyme scheme such as ABCB or ABAB.

Example:

And through the drifts the snowy clifts

Did send a dismal sheen

Nor shapes of men nor beasts we ken—

The ice was all between

3. Elegy

A poem written to mourn the loss of someone or something, often ending with a note of hope.

Example:

I am not resigned to the shutting away of loving hearts in the hard ground.

So it is, and so it will be, for so it has been, time out of mind:

Into the darkness they go, the wise and the lovely.

4. Epic

A long, detailed poem that tells a grand, often heroic, story.

Example from The Epic of Gilgamesh:

When the gods created Gilgamesh they gave him a perfect body.

Shamash the glorious sun endowed him with beauty,

Adad the god of the storm endowed him with courage.

5. Free Verse

A poem with no consistent rhyme scheme or meter, allowing for complete creative freedom.

Example:

A touch of cold in the Autumn night—

I walked abroad,

And saw the ruddy moon lean over a hedge

Like a red-faced farmer.

6. Ghazal

A short poem of five or more couplets, often dealing with themes of love and loss.

Example:

What will suffice for a true-love knot? Even the rain?

But he has bought grief’s lottery, bought even the rain.

7. Haiku

A Japanese form with a 5-7-5 syllable structure, often focused on nature.

Example:

An old silent pond . . .

A frog jumps into the pond,

splash! Silence again.

8. Limerick

A humorous five-line poem with an AABBA rhyme scheme.

Example:

There once was a man from Nantucket

Who kept all his cash in a bucket.

But his daughter, named Nan,

Ran away with a man

And as for the bucket, Nantucket.

9. Ode

A poem that praises a person, place, or thing.

Example:

Creatures for a day! What is a man?

What is he not? A dream of a shadow

Is our mortal being.

10. Sonnet

A 14-line poem following a specific rhyme scheme, such as the Shakespearean or Petrarchan format.

Example from The New Colossus:

Not like the brazen giant of Greek fame,

With conquering limbs astride from land to land;

Here at our sea-washed, sunset gates shall stand

A mighty woman with a torch.

11. Villanelle

A highly structured 19-line poem with repeated lines and a strict rhyme scheme.

Example from Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night by Dylan Thomas:

Do not go gentle into that good night,

Old age should burn and rave at close of day;

Rage, rage against the dying of the light.

Poetry allows for endless creativity—whether you enjoy structure or free-flowing lines, there’s a poetic form for you. Try experimenting with different types and see where your words take you!

Happy Writing!

From IABX

***Source: grammarly.com