Contrerime

The contrerime is a Quatrain combining introverted rhymes (ABBA) and cross structure metric (generally 8-6-8-6), which gives to the poem a systematic impression of imbalance. It was formalized and thus baptized by Paul-Jean Toulet, which used it in many poems, in particular in his collection éponyme Contrerimes . Here an example by this author:

Soft beach where was born my heart;

And you, savanna in flowers

That the Ocean soaks tears

And sun of flame;

Before him this kind of stanza was used only very exceptionally. One finds it nevertheless in this poem of Leconte de Lisle, Manchy :

Under a fresh cloud of clear muslin,

Every Sunday in the morning,

You came to the city in manchy from cane,

By the slopes of the hill.

After Toulet, the whimsical poets themselves, which however took it as model, only used it very seldom.

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