Sapphic stanza in Polish poetry is a hymn included in "Gorzkie żale" ("Bitter Lamentations"), a typically Polish Catholic devotion, sung in churches on Sundays during Lent, and familiar to many Poles. Neither Adam Mickiewicz nor Juliusz Słowacki used the classic Sapphic stanza. Słowacki, however, employed its general scheme in his own six-line stanza, discussed below. Cyprian Kamil Norwid, a poet regarded as one of the greatest Polish authors and perhaps the most modern of the poets of the 19th century, used Sapphic stanzas in the poem named "Trzy zwrotki" ("Three strophes"), as well as in many other poems including "Sieroctwo" ("Orphanhood"). Sometimes he implemented the
Sapphic stanza in Polish poetry scheme freely, as in the poem "Buntowniki" ("Rioters"). The second half of the 19th century in Polish literature was dominated by "pozytywizm" (positivism), which was the local Polish version of West-European realism. The two greatest poets of the time were Adam Asnyk and Maria Konopnicka. Their poetry was much influenced by French Parnassianism. Maria Konopnicka published more than twenty poems written in the form. She also used its scheme for constructing more complicated stanzas. Felicjan Faleński attempted a Polish Sapphic stanza more closely resembling the Greek and Latin models, and in translating Horace’s poetry used a hendecasyllable with the caesura