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book-poetry

Poetry craft reference: forms, the line, image, sound, compression, collection architecture, and poetry-specific AI tells. Read by all agents on poetry collections, chapbooks, and poetry-essay hybrids.

plugins/epicsagas/Velith/skills/book-poetry/SKILL.md

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# Poetry

A poem is the one form where the reader will forgive nothing. Every word is load-bearing. Machine poetry fails by being competent: correct images, reasonable line breaks, a closing turn, and nothing at stake.

## Form

Choose per poem, not per collection, unless the collection is a formal sequence.

- **Sonnet**: 14 lines, volta; Petrarchan (8+6) or Shakespearean (4+4+4+2). Meter loosened in contemporary practice but the turn is not optional.
- **Villanelle**: 19 lines, two refrains. The refrains must change meaning through repetition or the form is empty.
- **Ghazal**: couplets, radif, the poet's name in the last couplet. Each couplet autonomous.
- **Haiku / 하이쿠 / 俳句**: cut, season, concrete image. 5-7-5 is a guideline in English; in Japanese it is the form.
- **시조**: 3장 6구 45자 내외, 종장 첫 구 3음절 고정. Modern 시조 flexes everything but the 종장.
- **Free verse**: no fixed meter; the line break is the form. Every break must do something: emphasis, delay, double meaning, breath.