Villanelle
A villanelle is a nineteen-line poem of five three-line stanzas and a final four-line stanza, built on only two rhymes and two refrain lines that return in a fixed order.
The villanelle is a form that repeats itself on purpose. Two lines come back again and again, and each return means something slightly different because of what was said in between.
The pattern
Label the lines by their rhyme, with capitals for repeats.
- Stanza 1: A1 b A2
- Stanza 2: a b A1
- Stanza 3: a b A2
- Stanza 4: a b A1
- Stanza 5: a b A2
- Stanza 6: a b A1 A2
Every A line rhymes with the first, and every b line shares one other rhyme. Nineteen lines, two sounds. The form began as a French pastoral song and became fixed in its modern shape in the nineteenth century.
How it works
The repeated lines act like a refrain that the poet has to keep reinterpreting. By the end the first and third lines meet as a couplet, and they carry the weight of everything between them. The best villanelles use the repetition to build, so the line that meant one thing in stanza one has a different sense by stanza six.
Why it matters to a writer or editor
The form is a test of rigor. Any slack shows, because the two refrains must make sense in every position, and the in-between lines must keep finding new angles on them. When editing a villanelle, read only the refrains in order. If they do not move, the poem is repeating without developing. Then check the rhyme words for forced choices, since having only two sounds to find across nineteen lines is where the strain usually appears.
Read an example
Read an example: the first two stanzas of Edwin Arlington Robinson's villanelle. The first and third lines of stanza one return as the last lines of the later stanzas.
They are all gone away,
The House is shut and still,
There is nothing more to say.Through broken walls and gray
The winds blow bleak and shrill:
They are all gone away.Edwin Arlington Robinson, "The House on the Hill", 1896
Other fixed forms are easy to compare in the Bossfeed daily poem archive.
Frequently asked questions
What is the structure of a villanelle?
Nineteen lines. Call the first line A1 and the third A2. These two refrains return alternately as the last line of stanzas two to five and then together as the final two lines. Every line rhymes either with A or with the middle line, B.
What is the most famous villanelle?
Dylan Thomas's 'Do not go gentle into that good night' is the best known. Elizabeth Bishop's 'One Art' and Theodore Roethke's 'The Waking' are also widely taught.
Why is the villanelle good for obsession and grief?
The returning lines make the poem circle back on itself, which suits a mind that cannot let go of one thought.