Listen to Podcast Interview with Grace Cavalieri on The Poet and the Poem

Welcome to Pantoum Paradise. Anything worth saying is worth saying twice. The Pantoum presents the challenge of reputation according to a pretty strict mathematical form made up of a series of quatrains. In all but the first quatrain, the first line is a repetition of the second line of the preceding quatrain while the third line repeats the last or fourth line of the preceding quatrain. This pattern can go on for as many quatrains as the poet desires. However, the last quatrain must look back to the first quatrain and use the third line of the first quatrain as the second line of the last quatrain and the first line of the poem as the last line of the final quatrain and, hence, the last line of the poem.

This tool presents a helpful template to get started with a five quatrain pantoum. Fill the lines in using the textboxes on the left which will automatically populate the pantoum you are creating on the right. Enter the lines by clicking on the “set” button next to each line. Start with the first four lines and then add new lines until the pantoum is filled. The “clear” button will clear all instance of a line so you can make a new one. You can clear the entire pantoum with the “Clear All” button. When you’re done, click the “Create Pantoum” button and the poem will be saved to a text file for subsequent copying into Word or other editor.