A Pantoum is a dreamy form of French poetry which with its utterly charming repetitions creates a magical form of poetry, which cant be replicated by any other form. The structure of a Pantoum is very simple.
It consists of series of quatrains rhyming ABAB in which the second and fourth lines of a quatrain recur as the first and third lines in the succeeding quatrain; each quatrain introduces a new second rhyme as BCBC, CDCD. The first line of the series recurs as the last line of the closing quatrain, and third line of the poem recurs as the second line of the closing quatrain, rhyming ZAZA.
You can go as many stanzas as you wish as long as the ending stanza then repeats the second and fourth lines of the previous stanza (as its first and third lines), and also repeats the third line of the first stanza, as its second line, and the first line of the first stanza as its fourth. So the first line of the poem is also the last.
This is the format for the last stanza regardless of how many stanzas you have. This is cast in stone as far as Pantoum goes
Line 2 of previous stanza
Line 3 of first stanza
Line 4 of previous stanza
Line 1 of first stanza
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Boughs thrash about amidst flailing gale
Clouds tossed about in rolling thunder20 lines, 18 comments, on Jul 12 1:50 PM
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