quatrain

noun

qua·train ˈkwä-ˌtrān

kwä-ˈtrān

: a unit or group of four lines of verse

Examples of quatrain in a Sentence

Recent Examples on the Web The five-character quatrain, which rose to prominence during the Tang dynasty, has four lines consisting of five characters each. —

Olivia Wang, New York Times, 14 July 2023 This second quatrain shows the progress made by a model that has nearly finished its training. —

IEEE Spectrum, 30 Apr. 2020 The poem’s tercets evoke an uneasy balance, until the fourth stanza, where a quatrain appears, suspending time for just a little bit longer, like those who leaped from the burning floors. —

New York Times, 8 Sep. 2022 This week: Write a quatrain or — heck — two of Balliol rhyme about some person. —

Washington Post, 20 Feb. 2020 The three quatrains develop an idea or theme, and the final couplet puts forth a conclusion, a summary, an application, a narrowing of focus or even a surprise reversal. —

Richard Lederer, San Diego Union-Tribune, 28 Sep. 2019 There’s a quatrain of film adaptation news this week. —

Hayden Dingman, PCWorld, 24 May 2019 This example stitches poem (identified by the frame of quatrains) to prose (identified by the four lines inhabited by Absence). —

Lauren Russell, New York Times, 13 Oct. 2017 Kazemi, working under the name Tiny Subversions, also created the Harry Potter-themed , which generated rhyming quatrains that placed followers into a Hogwarts house. —

Adam Davidson, The New Yorker, 6 Mar. 2017 See More

These examples are programmatically compiled from various online sources to illustrate current usage of the word 'quatrain.' Any opinions expressed in the examples do not represent those of Merriam-Webster or its editors. Send us feedback about these examples.