2. What is a Sonnet? Understanding the forms, meter, rhyme, and other aspects of the sonnet.

3. Sonnet Form A sonnet has 14 lines. A sonnet must be written in iambic pentameter. A sonnet must follow a specific rhyme scheme, depending on the type of sonnet. A sonnet can be about any subject though they are often about love or nature. A sonnet introduces a problem or question in the beginning, and a resolution is offered after the turn.

4. Iambic Pentameter A line of iambic pentameter is a line with five stressed syllables An “iamb” has two beats or one “foot”—an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one.

5. English Sonnet An English Sonnet is also called a Shakespearean Sonnet. It includes three quatrains (groups of four lines) and a couplet (two lines). The rhyme scheme is often abab cdcd efef gg. The turn is either after eight lines or ten lines.

6. "Sonnet XXIX" When in disgrace with Fortune and men's eyes,A I all alone beweep my outcast state,B And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,A And look upon myself and curse my fate,B Wishing me like to one more rich in hope,C Featured like him, like him with friends possessed,D Desiring this man's art and that man's scope,C With what I most enjoy contented least,D Yet in these thoughts my self almost despising,E Haply I think on thee, and then my state,F (Like to the lark at break of day arisingE From sullen earth) sings hymns at heaven's gate,F For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings,G That then I scorn to change my state with kings.G

7. Italian Sonnet An Italian Sonnet is also called a Petrarchan Sonnet. It includes an octave (eight lines) and a sestet (six lines). The rhyme scheme must begin with abbaabba, and can conclude with any variation of c, d, and e (cdecde, cdcdee, etc.). The turn (volta) in subject matter or response must occur between the octave and the sestet.

8. The Cross of Snow BY HENRY WADSWORTH LONGFELLOW In the long, sleepless watches of the night, A gentle face — the face of one long dead — Looks at me from the wall, where round its head The night-lamp casts a halo of pale light. Here in this room she died; and soul more white Never through martyrdom of fire was led To its repose; nor can in books be read The legend of a life more benedight. There is a mountain in the distant West That, sun-defying, in its deep ravines Displays a cross of snow upon its side. Such is the cross I wear upon my breast These eighteen years, through all the changing scenes And seasons, changeless since the day she died.

9. Sonnet 130 My mistress' eyes are nothing like the sun; Coral is far more red than her lips' red; If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun; If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head. I have seen roses damasked, red and white, But no such roses see I in her cheeks; And in some perfumes is there more delight Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks. I love to hear her speak, yet well I know That music hath a far more pleasing sound; I grant I never saw a goddess go; My mistress when she walks treads on the ground. And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare As any she belied with false compare.