Rondeau
Quick answer: A rondeau is a 15-line French form on two rhymes whose opening phrase returns twice as a refrain. See how In Flanders Fields uses it and write your own.
A rondeau is a fifteen-line French form built on two rhyme sounds, arranged as stanzas of five, four and six lines. Its defining device is the rentrement: the opening words of line one, usually a phrase of four syllables or so, return as a short refrain at the end of the second and third stanzas. The scheme is aabba aabR aabbaR, where R is that returning phrase.
The form began as a medieval French song with a circling structure, which the name records: rond, round. What keeps poets writing rondeaux is the strange power of the rentrement. A phrase that seemed casual at the start comes back twice, stripped of its sentence, and each return makes it mean more. Choose those first words well and the poem practically aims itself.
The poem
In Flanders fields the poppies blow
Between the crosses, row on row,
That mark our place; and in the sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce heard amid the guns below.
John McCrae, 'In Flanders Fields' (1915)
How It Works
Only two rhyme sounds carry all the full lines, with eight a rhymes and five b rhymes to find, so English rondeaux lean on generous sounds and the occasional slant. The rentrement itself does not need to rhyme. Because it is a fragment, it lands with a different weight from any full line: clipped, echoing, final.
An invented opening shows the mechanism: 'We fixed the roof the summer father fell...' would give the rentrement 'We fixed the roof', a plain phrase on first reading that turns freighted when it returns after stanzas about what could not be fixed.
Where You Will See It
The most famous rondeau in English is John McCrae's 'In Flanders Fields', written in 1915 from the Belgian front, whose opening stanza is quoted on this page; the phrase 'In Flanders fields' tolls back twice exactly as the form demands. Two decades earlier Paul Laurence Dunbar had used the form for 'We Wear the Mask', letting the returning phrase name a whole condition of concealed suffering. Between them, these two poems demonstrate that the little French song form can hold war and injustice without strain.
How to Use It in Your Own Poems
Write your first line knowing its opening words will be excerpted, so put a phrase there that can stand alone: an action, an image, a claim. Draft the poem's argument in three movements matched to the stanzas, statement, complication, widening, and let each return of the rentrement register the change. The rondeau's compactness suits contest work; judges scoring language and emotion together notice a refrain that deepens on schedule, and at fifteen lines the form fits comfortably inside any entry limit, including Writory's.
What poets can take from this
- Front-load line one with a phrase that can stand alone as the rentrement.
- Choose two rhyme sounds with deep reserves; you need eight a words and five b words.
- Let each return of the refrain arrive from a changed emotional direction.
- Keep the metre light, tetrameter is traditional in English, so the circling feels like song.
- Read 'In Flanders Fields' and 'We Wear the Mask' side by side before attempting your own.
Try it yourself
Write a rondeau whose opening phrase is a household instruction, such as 'Leave the light on'. Let the poem discover why the instruction matters more than it first appeared.
Questions
What is the rentrement in a rondeau?
The rentrement is the refrain made from the opening words of the poem's first line, returning at the ends of the second and third stanzas. It is a fragment rather than a full line and does not need to rhyme.
What is the difference between a rondeau and a rondel?
Both are round French forms on two rhymes, but the rondel repeats its entire opening couplet at fixed points, while the rondeau repeats only the opening phrase of its first line. The historical boundary is blurry, and the names were once interchangeable.
Is In Flanders Fields really a rondeau?
Yes, a textbook one: fifteen lines on two rhymes in stanzas of five, four and six, with the opening phrase returning twice as the refrain.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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