Dizain is a decastich, a whole poem made up of a single Ballade Supreme stanza, a 10 line stanza.
Structure:
Line length: 8 or 10 syllables, iambs are not a prerequisite.
Rhyme Scheme: a b a b b c c d c d
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For those who would like to know how these stanzas become part of the whole, I have included the format of the full Ballade form, but this is not a requirement for today's challenge.
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| Source: Goodreads.com |
The Ballade, itself, could not be called a mini-challenge, but I will leave instructions here for those who may like to attempt the full poem.
Also known as "The Prince", because it traditionally began with the salutation: "Prince!" as its opening word, in homage to the judges of Medieval poetry competitions, the Ballade uses the basic Huitain form for its stanzas, with the addition of line 8 becoming a repeated refrain and the poem ending on a climactic envoy of 4 lines. Read more about the form, and see an example HERE.
The entire poem consists 28 lines: 3 eight line stanzas (with the final line repeated throughout) and the 4 line envoy.
Rhyme Scheme: a b a b b c b C a b a b b c b C a b a b b c b C and the envoy b c b C
For those even more intrepid, The Ballade Supreme takes the Dizain form to a 35 line completed poem. Find the instructions HERE.
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| Prince |
For those who prefer the Free Verse option, your theme is "The Prince" (or "The Princess").
PS. There seems to be some confusion as to what this challenge entails. It calls only for the ten line Dizain, and for neither the Ballade nor Ballade Supreme, which I have noted here for the sake of interest only.