A sestain is a six line poem or repetitive unit of a poem of this format (musaddas), comparable to quatrain (Ruba'i in Persian and Arabic) which is a four line poem or a unit of a poem. There are many types of sestain with different rhyme-schemes, for example aabbcc, ababcc, aabccb or aaabab. The sestains are probably next in popularity to quatrains in European literature. Usually there are three rhymes in the six-line strophe, but sometimes there are only two.
Rhyme-scheme aabbcc:I sprang to the stirrup, and Joris, and he;I gallop’d, Dirck gallop’d, we gallop’d all three;“Good speed !” cried the watch, as the gate-bolts undrew;“Speed!” echoed the wall to us galloping through;Behind shut the postern, the lights sank to rest,And into the midnight we gallop’d abreast.(Robert Browning, How They Brought the Good News from Ghent to Aix, 1-6)The aabbcc is the simplest rhyme-scheme of the sestain. It was very popular in Old Polish
poetry.
Rhyme-scheme ababcc:Even as the sun with purple-colour'd faceHad ta'en his last leave of the weeping morn,Rose-cheek'd Adonis hied him to the chase;Hunting he loved, but love he laugh'd to scorn;Sick-thoughted Venus makes amain unto him,And like a bold-faced suitor 'gins to woo him.(William Shakespeare, Venus and Adonis, 1-6)The ababcc rhyme-scheme is one of the most important forms in European poetry. It can be found in
Thomas Campion's and
Emma Lazarus's poetry.
Juliusz Słowacki wrote his poem
A Voyage to the Holy Land from Naples with the famous
The Tomb of Agamemnon in ababcc stanzas.
Rhyme-scheme abccba:The grey sea and the long black land;And the yellow half-moon large and low;And the startled little waves that leapIn fiery ringlets from their sleep,As I gain the cove with pushing prow,And quench its speed i' the slushy sand.(Robert Browning, Meeting at Night, 1-6)It was probably borrowed from the Italian sonnet rhymed sometimes abbaabba cdeedc.
Rhyme-scheme abbaab:As when a sick man very near to deathSeems dead indeed, and feels begin and endThe tears and takes the farewell of each friend,And hears one bid the other go, draw breathFreelier outside, ("since all is o’er," he saith,"And the blow fallen no grieving can amend;"):(Robert Browning, Childe Roland to the Dark Tower Came, 25-30)Rhyme-scheme ababab:She walks in beauty, like the nightOf cloudless climes and starry skies;And all that’s best of dark and brightMeet in her aspect and her eyes;Thus mellowed to that tender lightWhich heaven to gaudy day denies.(Lord Byron, She walks in Beauty, 1-6)Rhyme-scheme aabccb:Les sanglots longsDes violonsDe l’automneBlessent mon coeurD’une langueurMonotone.(Paul Verlaine, Chanson d'automne, 1-6)This rhyme scheme was extremely popular in French poetry. It was used by
Victor Hugo and Charles Leconte de Lisle. In English it is called the tail-rhyme stanza.
Rhyme-scheme aaabab:But Mousie, thou art no thy-lane,In proving foresight may be vain:The best laid schemes o’ Mice an’ MenGang aft agley,An’ lea’e us nought but grief an’ pain,For promis’d joy!(Robert Burns, To a Mouse, 37-42)It is Burns's stanza.
Rhyme-scheme abcabc:While that my soul repairs to her devotion,Here I intombe my flesh,1 that it betimesMay take acquaintance of this heap of dust;To which the blast of deaths incessant motion,Fed with the exhalation of our crimes,Drives all at last. Therefore I gladly trust(George Herbert, Church-monuments, 1-6)