Quatrain Quatrain A quatrain is a type of stanza, or a complete poem, consisting of four lines. Existing in a variety of forms, the quatrain appears in poems from the poetic traditions of various ancient civilizations including Ancient India, Ancient Greece, Ancient Rome, and China, and continues into the 21st century, where it is seen in works published in many languages. During Europe's Dark Ages, in the Middle East and especially Iran, polymath poets such as Omar Khayyam continued to popularize this form of poetry, also known as Ruba'i, well beyond their borders and time. Michel de Nostredame (Nostradamus) used the
Sapphic stanza in Polish poetry the lyric "Preludium" ("Prelude") she employed a seven-line stanza, built in much the same way: 11a/11b/11a/11a/5b/11c/5c. Once again she suggested Sappho's stanzaic pattern in the poem "Posłom wielkopolskim" ("To the deputies from the Greater Poland"), which goes 11a/11b/11a/5b/11c/11c; she repeated this scheme in "Improwizacja" ("Improvisation") and in "Ave, Patria". In the poem "Idź, idź w pokoju!" ("Go away in peace") Konopnicka used a six-line strophe 5a/11b/11b/11c/11c/5a. Another form used by Konopnicka suggestive of the Sapphic stanza is a quatrain composed of three hendecasyllabic lines and one trisyllable, used in "Kto krzywdę płodzi" ("Who begets harm"). More complicated is an eight-line