Pantoum
A pantoum is a type of poem that is commonly used to express lyrical, love, and other verities, they come of a french origin. Typically each line in a pantoum is between 8–12 syllables and follows the abab pattern. Although the final quatrain must change its pattern, it ends in a cdcd pattern, the unrepeated first and third lines are used in reverse as second and fourth lines in the last quatrain. Each stanza and group of lines following the scheme is called a quatrain. It also contains the prefatory couplet known as pembayang, which are common images drawn from the Malay life.
In Peter Meinke’s Atomic Pantoum they follow the scheme in the first and second stanza by repeating the lines “In a chain reaction/ the neutrons released.” (1) and then the next stanza starts with “the neutrons released” (2) It follows this scheme by using the second line of the stanza as the first for the following stanza. It follows this pattern all the way through until the last stanza. It starts with the second line from the previous stanza and ends with the first line of the previous stanza, instead of a different line.
Pantoum poems are typically very easy to follow and understand due to the constant repetition of lines, but this may also make the poem difficult for the reader to understand. It makes it harder to focus on what the author is trying to say, because there is a lot of repetition, and not many textual clues to interpret from.
Meinke, Peter. ‘Atomic Pantoum’. An Exaltation of Form: Contemporary Poets Celebrate the Diversity of Their Art. The University of Michigan Press. 1983. Print.
