The ode less travelled: unlocking the poet within

form’s derivations from, and yearnings towards, music

The usual rhyme scheme is ababbabA ababbabA ababbabA babA

these days an eight-line stanza with an envoi of four lines seems to have been settled upon by English-language poets.

Each stanza, the envoi included, ends with the same refrain or rentre

ends with an envoi which, tradition dictates, must be addressed to a Prince.

difficulty arises, not from any complexity of patterning or repetition such as is to be found in the sestina, but from the number of rhyme sounds needed.

a venerable French form of some fiendishness for English poets

art, as with other lexically repetitive and patterned schemes, is to choose ‘open-ended’ repeating lines allowing ambiguity and room for manoeuvre.

Note that enjambment and some flexibility with the repeated lines is helpful in refreshing the mood of the piece

effect, as my example suggests, can be quite hypnotic or doom-laden.