Stanza Stanza In poetry, a stanza (; from Italian "stanza" , "room") is a grouped set of lines within a poem, usually set off from other stanzas by a blank line or indentation. Stanzas can have regular rhyme and metrical schemes, though stanzas are not strictly required to have either. Even though the term "stanza" is taken from Italian, in the Italian language the word "strofa" is more commonly used. There are many unique . Some stanzaic forms are simple, such as four-line quatrains. Other forms are more complex, such as the Spenserian stanza. Fixed verse poems, such as sestinas, can
Alcaic stanza Italian poetry of 19th century, especially by Giosuè Carducci. As in English, the meter is accentual rather than quantatative. <poem style="margin-left:2em; font-style:italic"> Poi che un sereno vapor d’ambrosia da la tua còppa diffuso avvolsemi, </poem> It was an historically important form in Hungarian poetry. In Polish poetry (in contrast to the Sapphic stanza which was extremely popular since 16th century) Alcaics were used very rarely. Even in translation Horace's Alcaic stanzas were usually turned into different forms. An example (perhaps the only) of an Alcaic stanza in Polish original literature is Stanisław Trembecki's "Ode to Adam Naruszewicz": <poem style="margin-left:2em; font-style:italic">