Free Villanelle Generator
Generate a nineteen-line villanelle with both refrains placed correctly, so the repeated lines change meaning as they return.
A blank page, for now
Choose a form on the left, tell it what the poem is about, and it will write. You can edit every line afterwards.
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What is a villanelle?
Nineteen lines built around two lines that keep coming back. The villanelle works by obsession: the refrains return whether or not you are ready, and the poem earns its ending by making them mean something different each time.
The rules, exactly
- Exactly 19 lines: five tercets and a closing quatrain.
- Line 1 and line 3 are refrains.
- Line 1 repeats as lines 6, 12 and 18.
- Line 3 repeats as lines 9, 15 and 19.
- Rhyme scheme ABA throughout, closing ABAA.
- The refrains must shift in meaning as their context changes.
- Lines
- 19
- Rhyme
- ABA
Where it comes from
Despite the Italian name, the fixed nineteen-line form is a nineteenth-century French invention, codified by Théodore de Banville. English poets adopted it late, and Dylan Thomas and Elizabeth Bishop turned it into a vehicle for grief.
Do not go gentle into that good night, Old age should burn and rave at close of day.