[4] The tetrameter version is rarely found in practice except in prosodists' examples.
The following line, a mother's lament for her son, is found in the Ḥamāsa, an anthology of poems compiled in the 9th century by Abū Tammām:[6] In this version, there is a clear break between the two halves of the hemistich.
The following line is by the 8th-century Iraqi poet Abu-l-ʿAtahiya:[7] More often the trimeter is used in a catalectic version, that is, with the final syllable missing.
This variation, affecting the last three syllables of the line, is also found in the Basīṭ metre, and is also common in Persian poetry.
However, Halper quotes a piyyut written by the 12th-century Spanish scholar Abraham ibn Ezra in the trimeter version of the metre, which runs as follows:[11] Because of the rarity of short syllables in Hebrew, Ibn Izra chooses the long alternative of each anceps.