TRIOLET

    

     Triolet means clover leaf and takes its name from the triple use of line 1. 

     The triolet, one of the simpler French forms, contains 8 lines using only 2 rhymes. The rhyme pattern is a-b-a-a-a-b-a-b.  Line 1 is repeated as line 4, and the opening 2 lines, in the same order, are repeated as the last two lines of the poem. The rhyme pattern is a-b-a-a-a-b-a-b.  Triolet poets seems partial to either 3-beat or 4-beat lines.  No specific meter is required.

     Some skillful poets, notably Austin Dobson, have managed to add piquancy to the form by giving a different meaning to the refrain lines from that in the opening lines. It's a neat trick.  Here is an example:


A KISS

Rose kissed me today
    Will she kiss me tomorrow?
Let it be as it may.
Rose kissed me today.
But the pleasure gives way
    to a savor of sorrow--
Rose kissed me today.
    Will she kiss me tomorrow.

                         Austin Dobson

Here is a famous triolet by Thomas Hardy. 

HOW GREAT MY GRIEF 
    
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Since first it was my fate to know thee!
Have the slow years not brought to view
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Nor memory shaped old times anew,
Nor loving-kindness helped to show thee
How great my grief, my joys how few,
Since first it was my fate to know thee? 

   
Here's an interesting effort, a double triolet in a poem by Dana Gioia, from Rebel Angels, 25 Poets of the New Formalism. 

THE COUNTRY WIFE 

She makes her way through the dark trees
Down to the lake to be alone.
Following their voices on the breeze,
She makes her way. Through the dark trees
The distant stars are all she sees. 
They cannot light the way she's gone.
She makes her way through the dark trees
Down to the lake to be alone.

The night reflected on the lake,
The fire of stars changed into water. 
She cannot see the winds that break
The night reflected on the lake,
But knows they motion for her sake.
These are the choices they have brought her. 
The night reflected on the lake. 
The fire of stars changed into water. 


Here's another example, this one by Harold Witt,
who must be a scientist.

FIRST PHOTOS OF FLU VIRUS

Viruses, when the lens is right,
change into a bright bouquet.
Are such soft forms of pure delight
viruses? When the lens is right,
instead of forms of shapeless blight, 
we see them in a Renoir way.
Viruses, when the lens is right,
change into a bright bouquet.


 Another famous triolet is "Untitled" by Robert Bridges. Today's experts tell us, however, that it is no longer acceptable to call a poem "Untitled." Michael Bugeia discusses this in his helpful book, The Art and Craft of Poetry, Writers Digest Books, Cincinnati, 1994.  

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