Classical poetry, also known as ancient poetry or ancient style. This concept is different from the usual "ancient poetry". It is a special term, which refers to a poetic style that was popular before the Tang Dynasty and continued to be popular in the Tang Dynasty, as opposed to modern poetry formed in the Tang Dynasty. The characteristics of classical poetry are: the number of sentences is not limited, the number of words in each sentence is not limited, and it can rhyme or not, and it can rhyme or change. It is not required that sentences should be flush with each other, and words should be confronted with each other. In a word, classical poetry is relatively free in meter, which is quite different from modern poetry in meter. Ancient poems can be divided into five-character poems and seven-character poems (or five-character poems and seven-character poems for short). In addition, there are ancient poems with irregular sentence patterns, which are generally classified as seven ancient poems. Some ancient poems are the same in number, number of words and meter, but different in rhyme, level and antithesis, so they are still ancient poems. The Nineteen Ancient Poems mentioned above and the poems of Tao Yuanming and others are all ancient poems.

Modern poetry, also known as modern poetry ("modern" and "modern" are Tang Dynasty terms), emphasizes strict meter. Modern poetry has four basic requirements: first, it stipulates the number of sentences and words; The second is to rhyme according to the prescribed rhyme department; Third, the words of the upper sentence and the lower sentence are required to be flat, right and sticky; Fourth, it is stipulated that some sentences should use words, that is, nouns to nouns, verbs to verbs, adjectives to adjectives, etc.

Modern poetry is divided into two categories: (1) regular poetry, which consists of eight sentences, five of which are called five-character regular poetry and seven are called seven-character regular poetry. (2) The quatrains consist of four sentences, five of which are called five-character quatrains and seven are called seven-character quatrains.