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 stanza 11/11/11/5/11/11/11/3 (rhymed ABABCCAB), as was employed in the "W Porta Pia" ("In Porta Pia"). Another form developed by Konopnicka is the five-line strophe including decasyllabic lines and masculine rhymes: 10m/5f/10m/10m/5f, used in "Którzy idziemy" ("We that are going"). Adam Asnyk wrote an epigram (Italian strambotto) "Ironia" ("Irony") in the form of ottava rima with the last line being a pentasyllable. He also often combined octosyllables with a pentasyllable, making a quasi-Sapphic stanza of 8/8/8/5. He was not the first poet to use such a stanza, being preceded by Franciszek Dionizy Kniaźnin and by the Romantic poet Kazimierz Brodziński. There