Sonnet
a lyric poem dealing with some single idea, or single phase of sentiment expressed in a single stanza of prescribed form. The sonnet originated with Petrarch, an Italian poet of the fourteenth century. The first sonnets in the English language were written by Thomas Wyatt, an English poet of the sixteenth century much employed by Henry VIII on foreign embassies. He had a friend and imitator in the poet Surrey. The sonnet consists of fourteen iambic pentameter lines. Milton's sonnet On His Blindness is a fine example of this form of poetry and will serve to show the usual arrangement of rhymes:
Ere half my days, in this dark world and wide,
And that one talent which is death to hide b
Lodged with me useless, though my soul more bent
To serve therewith my Maker, and present a
My true account, lest he returning, chide; b
"Doth God exact day-labor, light denied?" b
I fondly ask. But Patience, to prevent a
That murmur, soon replies "God doth not need c
Either man's work, or his own gifts. Who best
Bear his mild yoke, they serve him best.
His state
Is kingly; thousands at his bidding speed, c
And post o'er land and ocean without rest; d
They also serve who only stand and wait. e
Poets vary the arrangement of rhymes slightly, especially in the last six lines, where the order c d c d c d is very common. In a perfect sonnet, the emotional feeling or sentiment increases through the first eight lines, or octave as they are called, and subsides through the last six lines or sextet, reaching the climax in the eighth line. The sonnet has sometimes been called the "wave of flow and ebb." Shakespeare, Milton, Keats, Wordsworth, Mrs. Browning, and many other poets have written beautiful sonnets. Mrs. Browning's Sonnets from the Portuguese are among the finest examples. See Poetry; Lyric; Wyatt