# Acrostic poem > A poem in which the first letters of the lines, read downward, spell a word, a name or a message. Some acrostics hide the word in the middle or last letters instead. Also known as acrostic ## In practice An acrostic poem is a poem whose lines begin with letters that, read from top to bottom, spell a word, a name or a phrase. The word is usually the poem's subject or the person it is written for, so the poem says something across each line and something else down its edge. Acrostics are very old. Several Hebrew psalms, including Psalm 119, begin their verses with the letters of the alphabet in order. Medieval and Renaissance poets hid their own names or the names of patrons in acrostics, and Lewis Carroll ended Through the Looking-Glass (1871) with a poem that spells Alice Pleasance Liddell. Today the acrostic is one of the first poems many children write, on their own name. It also works as a puzzle: a reader who notices the hidden word sees the poem a second time. ## Acrostic poem examples Lewis Carroll, "A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky": the first letters of its twenty-one lines spell ALICE PLEASANCE LIDDELL, the girl who inspired the Alice books. Edgar Allan Poe's "An Acrostic" spells ELIZABETH down its side. A simple example on the word RAIN: "Running down the window, / All afternoon it taps, / In puddles on the street, / Nothing stays dry." Each line adds an image, and the word ties them together. ## How to write an acrostic poem Choose a short word or name and write its letters down the left side of the page. Before you fill the lines, list images and ideas connected to the word, so each line says something about it rather than just starting with the right letter. Lines can run on into each other; they do not need to be separate sentences. Letters such as X, Q and Z are hard, so look for one of the few words that start with them (xylophone, quiet, zigzag), or change the word the poem spells. Read the poem across first: it should work even for a reader who never notices the acrostic. ## Types of acrostic poems In a standard acrostic, the first letters spell the word. In a telestich, the last letters do. In a mesostich, the letters run down the middle of the lines. A double acrostic spells words with both the first and the last letters. An abecedarian poem is a special acrostic whose lines begin with the letters of the alphabet in order, A to Z, like Psalm 119. Poets still write abecedarians as a challenge and a way to find unexpected words. ## Start from a free template - [Poem Template: Plan, Draft and Revise a Poem](https://www.inkwell.software/templates/poem-draft): Start a poem from one moment you noticed. A free, editable poem worksheet takes you from images to a first draft and a revision checklist, with an original worked example. ## Official sources & context Sources reviewed Nov 13, 2026 - [Academy of American Poets — Acrostic](https://poets.org/glossary/acrostic) - [Merriam-Webster — Acrostic](https://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/acrostic) ## Common questions ### What is an acrostic poem? An acrostic poem is a poem whose first letters of each line, read downward, spell a word, a name or a message, usually the poem's subject. ### What is an example of an acrostic poem? Lewis Carroll's "A Boat Beneath a Sunny Sky" spells ALICE PLEASANCE LIDDELL with the first letters of its lines. ### Does an acrostic poem have to rhyme? No. An acrostic can rhyme or not. The only rule is that the chosen letters spell the word. ### What is the difference between an acrostic and an abecedarian poem? An acrostic spells a word or name. An abecedarian poem starts its lines with the letters of the alphabet in order, from A to Z. ### How many lines are in an acrostic poem? As many as the letters in the word it spells. A poem on the word RAIN has four lines. ## Related terms - [Haiku](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/haiku): A short Japanese poem of seventeen sound units in three phrases of five, seven and five, usually with a seasonal word and a cut between two images. In English it is often written as three short lines. - [Limerick](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/limerick): A five-line comic poem that rhymes AABBA. The long first, second and fifth lines have three beats; the short third and fourth lines have two, and the last line lands the joke. - [Stanza](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/stanza): A group of lines in a poem, set off from the next group by a blank line. Stanzas are named by their length: a couplet has two lines, a tercet three, a quatrain four. - [Rhyme Scheme](https://www.inkwell.software/glossary/rhyme-scheme): The pattern of end rhymes in a poem, written as letters: lines that rhyme share a letter, so endings light, rain, night, lane make ABAB. - [Full guide: How to Write a Poem](https://www.inkwell.software/learn/how-to-write-a-poem): How to write a poem, step by step: finding a subject, building it from images, choosing a form, breaking lines, sound and rhythm, figurative language, the ending, revision and where to share it. --- Canonical page: