Terza rima sonnet.

Another original creation of Dante, the terza rima sonnet is a rare but superb form that blends four quatrains and a rhyming couplet with a terza rima rhyme scheme. The most noteworthy example is in one of Percy Bysshe Shelley’s most famous poems, “Ode to the West Wind.”

Ode to the West Wind

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/poem/174401 [for the entire poem]

BY PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY

I
O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,
Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves dead
Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing,
Yellow, and black, and pale, and hectic red,
Pestilence-stricken multitudes: O thou,
Who chariotest to their dark wintry bed
The winged seeds, where they lie cold and low,
Each like a corpse within its grave, until
Thine azure sister of the Spring shall blow
Her clarion o’er the dreaming earth, and fill
(Driving sweet buds like flocks to feed in air)
With living hues and odours plain and hill:
Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;
Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh hear!

2 thoughts on “Terza rima sonnet.

  1. To be pedantic – it should be four ‘tercets’ and a couplet! A form that I hadn’t recognised before.

    1. Thank you.I had serious problems with WP last night.It deleted part.I have posted a version from the Poetry Foundation which I meant to do earlier.I had not known the name of this form before.I suppose it’s not used a lot.In academia rhyming is out!

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