“The Dead” is an American sonnet. The term was originally coined by the American poet Wanda Coleman and then later popularized by Terrance Hayes, and refers to a 14-line free-verse poem. Drawing on the tradition of Petrarchan and Shakespearean sonnets but rejecting its highly formal structure, these poems lack the rigid meters and rhyme schemes of their predecessors and instead experiment with internal rhyme and rhythm. The only real rule for an American sonnet is that it be 14-lines—although this, too, can be sidestepped, as is the case in Billy Collins’s “American Sonnet.”

“The Dead” is written in free verse, meaning it has no consistent rhyme scheme or meter. Individual lines range from three syllables (“they wake us” [Line 12]) to 13 syllables (“their worries for us. They take out the old photographs” [Line 3]). Generally, lines toward the beginning of the poem are longer while the lines toward the end are shorter, giving the poem a visually shrinking quality (although this is not definitive; the penultimate line is one of the poem’s longest). Additionally, the poem enhances its rhythm with repeated words and phrases, such as “They” preceding an action, or the parallel “At night” and “all night” (Lines 1, 14).