* Ballad Origins: Ballads were originally folk songs, passed down orally. They were often quite long, with many verses to tell a story.
* Modern Usage: Today, poets use "ballad" to describe a poem that:
* Tells a story: Often with a dramatic, tragic, or romantic theme.
* Has a simple, often repetitive structure: This helps with memorization and oral storytelling.
* Uses a specific meter and rhyme scheme: Commonly iambic tetrameter (four beats per line) and alternating rhymes (ABAB or ABCB).
In essence, a ballad can be short or long, but it's the content and structure that make it a ballad.
Examples:
* Short: "The Raven" by Edgar Allan Poe is a narrative poem with a ballad-like structure, though shorter than traditional folk ballads.
* Long: "The Ballad of the Green Berets" by Robin Moore is a lengthy ballad detailing the experiences of a group of Green Berets in Vietnam.
Ultimately, the length of a ballad depends on the story it tells and the poet's artistic choices.