Couplet

A couplet is a pair of consecutive lines in a poem, usually rhyming and of equal length, that together make one complete thought.

Alexander Pope, in "An Essay on Criticism", wrote: "True ease in writing comes from art, not chance, / As those move easiest who have learned to dance." Two lines, two rhymed endings, one finished thought. The second line answers the first like a click.

Kinds of couplet

• Heroic couplet. Rhymed iambic pentameter in which each pair is self-contained. It reads as tidy, balanced and a little epigrammatic.
• Closing couplet. The last pair of a Shakespearean sonnet. It lands the conclusion.
• Open couplet. The sentence carries across the line break, so the pair feels loose and conversational. Chaucer's verse often does this.

Why the form works

Because two lines are so short, a couplet has the feel of a proverb. It makes a claim and shuts the door, which is why aphorisms and mottos so often rhyme. The risk is the same thing seen from the other side: a run of couplets can sound like a drumbeat, with every thought squeezed to the same size.

Why it matters to a writer or editor

A couplet is a lesson in endings. The last word of the pair carries the weight, so check that it is the right word and not just the one that rhymes. An editor looking at a long poem in couplets should also watch for monotony and look for places where a thought can run on, as an open couplet does, to vary the pace.

See also the stanza for the larger unit a couplet can form part of, and the rhyme scheme notation, where a couplet is AA.

Read an example

Read an example: "The Tyger" by William Blake (1794), a public domain poem on Bossfeed, where the lines pair off in hammering rhymed couplets.

Frequently asked questions

What is a heroic couplet?

A pair of rhymed lines in iambic pentameter that closes its thought at the end of the second line. Alexander Pope and John Dryden made it the signature form of the eighteenth century.

What is a closing couplet?

The final two lines of a Shakespearean sonnet, rhyming GG. They usually sum up the poem or turn it on its head.

Can a couplet be unrhymed?

Yes. Any two lines that stand together as a unit can be called a couplet, though in most traditional verse the pair rhymes.