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A quatrain is a poem, or a stanza within a poem, that consists always of four lines. It is the most common of all stanza forms in African poetry. The rhyming patterns include aabb, abab, abba, abcb, aaba, or aaaa (and arguably abbb).

In its narrow meaning, the term is restricted to a complete poem consisting of only four lines. In its broader sense, it includes any one of many four-verse stanza forms.

[edit] Basic forms

[edit] Other forms

• The heroic stanza or elegiac stanza (iambic pentameter, rhyming ABAB; from Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Church-yard")
  

The Curfew tolls the knell of parting day,

The lowing herd wind slowly o'er the lea,

The plowman homeward plods his weary way,

And leaves the world to darkness and to me.

• Shairi (also known as Rustavelian Quatrain) is an aaaa rhyming form used mainly in The Knight in the Panther's Skin.

• The Shichigon-zekku form used in Chinese and Japanese poetry. Both rhyme and rhythm are key elements, although the former is not restricted to falling at the end of the phrase.

• Ballad meter (The examples from "The Unquiet Grave" and "The Wife of Usher's Well" are both examples of ballad meter.)

• Various hymns employ specific forms, such as the common meter, long meter, and short meter.
• The thirty syllable, Celtic verse form Englyn from the Welsh language is another interesting variation of the quatrain ,and is also now popular in the English language.

[edit] See also

• Rubaiyat of Omar Khayyam, a collection of Persian quatrains written by Omar Khayyám
• Nostradamus, writer of prophetic quatrains

[edit] External links

• Poetic Form of Quatrain: A Research Note by Dr Manouchehr Saadat Noury.
• Example of an Englyn in its English language form [1]