काव्यम्
Sanskrit Poems — Structure & Examples
Classical Sanskrit poetry (काव्य, kāvya) is built on strict metrical rules (छन्दस्, chandas) and rich ornamentation (अलङ्कार, alaṅkāra) — sound and sense working together deliberately.
The building block: Chandas (meter)
Unlike English poetry's stress-based meter, Sanskrit meter counts syllable length — light (laghu) and heavy (guru) — in fixed patterns. The Anushtubh meter (8 syllables × 4 quarters = the Shloka form) is the most common; the Bhagavad Gita is written almost entirely in it.
A short example
वासांसि जीर्णानि यथा विहाय नवानि गृह्णाति नरोऽपराणि। तथा शरीराणि विहाय जीर्णा न्यन्यानि संयाति नवानि देही॥
vāsāṃsi jīrṇāni yathā vihāya navāni gṛhṇāti naro 'parāṇi, tathā śarīrāṇi vihāya jīrṇāni anyāni saṃyāti navāni dehī
As a person casts off worn-out garments and takes new ones, so the embodied self casts off worn-out bodies and enters others that are new.
Alankara — poetic ornamentation
Classical Sanskrit poetics identifies dozens of named devices: Upama (simile — "as," "like"), Rupaka (metaphor), Anuprasa (alliteration), and Yamaka (repeated sound patterns), among many others. The verse above uses Upama, comparing the soul changing bodies to a person changing clothes.
Related pages
See our Sanskrit Shlok collection for more verses, or Subhashita for shorter wisdom sayings.