“Describe Yourself in Three Words or Less” is a poem written by African-American poet, Rita Dove. Dove wrote this most likely with the intentions of trying to describe herself in three words or less, however, she was unable to do so. But what she was able to do in the poem was describe herself in three stanzas instead. Looking at the structural elements of the poem one can see that it contains three stanzas. These three stanzas are in octave, heptastich, and heptastich form. Or, more simply put, eight lines in the first stanza, followed by two stanzas of seven lines each. There seems to be no distinct pattern of the enjambments and end-stopped lines found amongst the stanzas. On line fourteen we do find the lone caesura of the poem. The
