Choosing a Form

[Wildcard]

   Since becoming interested in poetry I have been drawn to learning about different forms. In some of the books I've read, they suggest that some forms are better suited for one type of poem. For example, Haiku has rules about content and therefore excludes some topics, but free verse is unrestricted and can be about anything.

My question is this: How do you decide what form you will write a poem in?

[Todd]

I know this answer will seem vague, but you choose the form that best represents what you're trying to acheive with the poem. If a Sonnet says it best you go Sonnet. Most of the time though I start from a place of comfort (for good or bad) which means free verse. The main issue for me in starting that way is I don't want to be so focused on the form that the content suffers. However, once I'm a draft or two in and I start to revise I may decide that another form conveys better. There are other times where conforming to a specific form my make you come up with phrasing that you never would have stumbled on. If Leanne hadn't had us write Kyrielles I never would have come up with this phrasing:

Each day I sit in asphalt haze
a brake light death of small delays

Which is more elegant than where the free verse was taking me.

Different forms cause you to approach the material differently. I read a large biography on Howard Hughes and was fascinated by his memo to his staff on how to open a can of peaches.

I started with a Rubia called Peaches. I wasn't happy with how it sounded. What I was trying to express wasn't coming through. I moved to a free verse structure (to try to capture the speaker's (Hughes's) voice and it felt more right. I think that's the key what feels more right. What has more clarity, more power.

Just some thoughts,

Todd

[Wildcard]

Thanks for the help Todd

[Philatone]

Taking it a step further, I think form can extend to shifts inside of the poem. For instance, in an otherwise metered poem, maybe there is a section on the wind. here, it may be good to break from from, disrupt line breaks, alter spacing. if a free verse poem has a small section related to music, maybe some brief rhyme and meter could help. it depends how much you want the form to reinforce the meaning. if it gets to be a distraction, maybe it would be best to let it rest.

[Leanne]

When you're just learning forms, your best bet is to practise them until you get a feel for why certain elements work and how they can best be used. It's also a good exercise to try rewriting free verse into form -- some free verse poems will lend themselves more strongly to certain forms, for example a poem with a particularly strong line that could stand repeating might be made into a ballade or kyrielle, two strong lines and you've virtually got yourself a villanelle . Sonnets work best for lyric (non-narrative) concepts, the abstracts of emotion or philosophy. For narrative poems, you might like to start here. Short, poignant concepts lend themselves nicely to the rondelet or virelai.

When you've been writing in form and free verse for a while, patterns will start to emerge and you'll find it easier to identify which vessel is better for your poem. As Philatone suggests, elements of form can be blended into a free verse piece -- like I keep telling people, learning about form poetry, meter and rhyme and such, can only strengthen your free verse. Besides, the fusion of free verse and form can create some really cool poetry (or some really horrible garbage).

[billy]

   Since becoming interested in poetry I have been drawn to learning about different forms. In some of the books I've read, they suggest that some forms are better suited for one type of poem. For example, Haiku has rules about content and therefore excludes some topics, but free verse is unrestricted and can be about anything.

My question is this: How do you decide what form you will write a poem in?

personally i decide to write a poem with form or a free verse. as long as it works and i'm in the mood i don'y really care. i enjoy the haiku because while being siple in it's idea. it's quite a twat to get it spot on. the senryu is a lot easier and forgivin. a half decent one can be knocked out in a short time. even haiku can once you get the hang of it. there hand for me because they tend to get the juices flowing and the head thinking with some kind of order. often i'll do a haiky to clear to fog, then i'll have a go at whatever's in the air. i nearly always try my hand at the poetry lessons even if it just a single poem.

i think with form
i decide;
today i'll do a sonnet
or what ever is
on the lesson schedule.
i do prefer free verse
because i'm personally able
to en-jamb better.
with it,
free verse poems
just seem to appear
though i do have to redo the do
in order to get some
rhythm runs to cue within
a line of inner rhyme.