informal talk about forms: the pantoum

by Tom Adam

Repetition is one of the pillars of poetry. Sometimes the repetition is of words and phrases (as in sestinas, ghazals, or villanelles), sometimes it’s a repetition of sound (rhyme, alliteration, assonance), sometimes the rhythm of the words (which we most clearly see in formal meters like iambic pentameter). All these types of repetition are used to reinforce certain elements in the poem or to bring greater cohesiveness.

Most poetic forms are based on some form of repetition and use it to create specific movements through the poem. Along with the villanelle, the pantoum is one of the most highly repetitive poetic forms.

Harmony of Evening by Charles Baudelaire
Translated by A. S. Kline

Now those days arrive when, stem throbbing,
each flower sheds its fragrance like a censer:
sounds and scents twine in the evening air:
languorous dizziness, Melancholy dancing!

Each flower sheds its fragrance like a censer:
the violin quivers, a heart that’s suffering:
languorous dizziness, Melancholy dancing!
the sky is lovely, sad like a huge altar.

The violin quivers, a heart that’s suffering:
a heart, hating the vast black void, so tender!
the sky is lovely, sad like a huge altar:
the sun is drowned, in its own blood congealing.

A heart, hating the vast black void, so tender:
each trace of the luminous past it’s gathering!
The sun is drowned, in its own blood congealing…
A vessel of the host, your memory shines there.

The pantoum is a series of quatrains rhyming A-B-A-B where the second and fourth lines of one stanza become the first and third lines of the next stanza. As in “Harmony of Evening,” pantoum traditionally feature lines that are fully end-stopped (the poem above does not rhyme because it is a translation from French, but it does rhyme in French!) and the repeated lines are repeated verbatim. They can be of any length and generally just end without any special envoy or closure. Some modern authors of the Pantoum have loosened these constraints, as they have with most forms, but it is often written in the traditional way.

But, why write a pantoum at all? What is a pantoum going to do for my poem? What makes it special? I had said the villanelle was an excellent form to use when writing about obsession because the constant refrains always bring you back to the beginning of the poem, leading to a circular form. The pantoum, on the other hand, continues making forward progress throughout the poem. Each stanza brings new lines and new rhymes but the close repetition has a constant backwards pull. This makes the pantoum have a feel of “two steps forward, one step back.” Some poets use this halting progress to generate a feeling of ambivalence, some use it nostalgically. Regardless of the feeling it is used to generate, the constant repetition does force the pantoum to stay close to one idea; it has very little room for divergence.

The pantoum, though it often is, does not have to be ambivalent or dark or depressing or blah blah blah. Cecilia Woloch’s “Bareback Pantoum” has a wild exuberance to it. But Donald Justice’s “Pantoum of the Great Depression” is one of the most iconic pantoums in the English language.

Learn more at the poets.org page on the pantoum and A.E. Stallings “Another Lullaby for Insomniacs” at poetryfoundation.org.

jillypoet

February 28th, 2008 at 9:35 am

I am thrilled that this is your topic! I have run across quite a few pantoums lately. Seems it is becoming a fresh, “new” form for fresh new poets. Most times I knew it was a form, but didn’t know the name. Then, just last night (talk about synchronicity) I read “Pantoum for a Roane County Childbirth, 1942,” by Leilani Hall (from Swimming the Witch, 9 to 5 Poet’s Poetry Book Club Pick this month). I read it at least three times. It is such a powerful poem, and the repetition is indeed one aspect that gives it its power.

Thanks so much for the discussion. I’m psyched to try one!

The Phantom

February 28th, 2008 at 7:51 pm

I’ll let you decide if this was ingenious or just plain lazy but I decided to complete three of this week’s assignements in one poem. So here for your consideration are the Poefusion Friday 5 and 3WW in the ReadWritePoem requested Pantoum form.

I very much enjoyed this form because it did help me pace the development of the sentiment expressed. Without the constraints, the revelation would probably have come too fast.

On Being Perfect

Read Write Poem

February 28th, 2008 at 11:48 pm

Hi Phantom, this is not quite the post you link your poem to. Come back Sunday after midnight (CST) and look for “get your poem on”; you have few readers who see your link here.

Also, any more that one link in your comment sends you into the spam filter and it might take a while before anyone notices it.

pepektheassassin

February 29th, 2008 at 9:51 am

I absolutely lovelovelove the Cecilia Woloch phantom! Great article this!

February 29th, 2008 at 12:47 pm

I mean, pantoum, Phantom! Silly me.

Christine

February 29th, 2008 at 4:16 pm

Tom, thanks for this post. I just read Bareback Pantoum and loved it! To me is has a galloping, thundering wild tone that makes me remember what it was like to be young! I can’t wait to try this form.