The Italian octave is a poem with the same structural requirements as the first eight lines of an Italian/Petrarchan sonnet. This means it will have eight lines in Iambic pentameter with an ABBAABBA rhyme scheme. It is unknown which of these two forms came first. (The sonnet or the octave...
The rhyme scheme creates a chaotic feeling, as well as feelings of disorganization and confusion, just as the world Prufrock resides in, and it does a good job portraying the anxiety that is rooted in the social world. He is afraid to confront those talking pointlessly about Michelangelo as ...