Super Glossary

Open Poetic Form

Entertainment / Literature / Open Poetic Form: A poem of variable length, one which can consist of as many lines as the poet wishes to write. Every poem written in open poetic form, therefore, is unique. Open poetic form contrasts with closed poetic form, in which the specific subgenre of poetry requires a predetermined number of stanzas, lines, feet, or other components. For instance, a sonnet is a closed poetic form, in which the poem can be no more or no less than fourteen lines long, with ten syllables in each line. Open poetic form is not to be confused with free verse poetry. Free verse poetry is a subtype of open poetry, but it is not constrained by any conventions at all regarding meter or rhyme. For example, Alfred Noyes, 'The Highwayman' is in open poetic form. Although 'The Highwayman' has a set structure for rhyme and meter, the number of stanzas necessary to tell the poem is not predetermined by a required length, as is the case in a limerick or a sonnet. However, Walt Whitman's poem 'Song of Myself' is written in open poetic form and it is also written in free verse form. Whitman's lines vary in length, and the meter varies from passage to passage, and any rhymes appear haphazardly rather than as part of a predetermined pattern required by a genre's constraints.
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