by Tom Adam
Following up on last month’s talk about the two “root” styles of verse, today we’ll explore metrical verse. Most formal poetry uses this as its basis.
Metrical verse
Most English verse uses an accentual-syllabic rhythm. While this could be four stresses in an eight-syllable line with no regard to the pattern, most accentual-syllabic verse uses meter: iambic pentameter, trochaic trimeter, etc. In a “best of both worlds” type of scenario, metrical verse gets to use the strong beats of the English language to give the poem an aural structure, and it gets an air of “refinement,” because it is clearly a crafted work, while purely accentual could just be prose broken (without taking the other elements into consideration) into lines by beats.
Formally, there are many types of meter, though only six have any real use. When talking about meter, there are two elements: what type of foot is used, and how many feet per line. How many per line is the second half of the description: it is (some) meter where some is a numerical prefix (penta=5, di=2, hep=7, etc.). The foot describes the repeated pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. The six that cover the overwhelming majority of English verse are these (again, the bolded syllables are the stresses):
- Iamb: generally considered the most common foot in the English language, and therefore in English poetry, the iamb is the repetition of unstressed followed by stressed syllables. If you want to get a feel for Iambic verse, check out Shakespeare, it’s just about all based on Iambic lines.
“But soft, what light through yonder window break“
- Trochee: Easiest way to think of trochaic verses is that it is the opposite of Iambic-it has stressed syllables followed by unstressed. For most English speaker, this has a very strange feel, but (courtesy of Wikipedia) the lines from Poe’s “The Raven” are trochaic:
“Ah, distinctly I remember it was in the bleak December;
And each separate dying ember wrought its ghost upon the floor.”
- Finishing out the two-syllable patterns are spondees and pyrrhics, respectively two stressed and two unstressed syllables. Apparently, this line from Tennyson’s In Memoriam, is a good example of a pyrrhic foot, a spondee, a pyrrhic and a last spondee:
“When the blood creeps and the nerves prick“
- Three syllable patterns are also common. The anapest is two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable:
“The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold“
-Byron, “The Destruction of Sennacherib”
- Opposite the anapest is the dactyl: one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables. A poetic form (of usually nonsense or children’s verse) is called the double-dactyl where all the lines dactylic dimeter. While not nonsense, the word ‘lexicographical’ is a double dactyl.
While there are technical terms for patterns longer than three syllables, they are pretty much not used (as patterns or terms), because they can usually be broken down into patterns of patterns. It is also important to note that most writers don’t stay strictly to meter; Shakespeare frequently added an unstressed syllable at the end of his iambic pentameter line to have a feminine ending, and switched trochees in every once in a while.
Meter, like accentual verse, can act like a metronome for the poem. By keeping the speed of the lines fairly consistent, it leaves a solid base for the poet to explore variations that stay connected because of the meter. On the other hand, the types of words used can force the speed of the meter to become faster or slower to affect pacing. Alexander Pope comments on this in his Essay on Criticism:
The Sound must seem an Eccho to the Sense.
Soft is the Strain when Zephyr gently blows,
And the smooth Stream in smoother Numbers flows;
But when loud Surges lash the sounding Shore,
The hoarse, rough Verse shou’d like the Torrent roar.
When Ajax strives, some Rocks’ vast Weight to throw,
The Line too labours, and the Words move slow;
The most important thing about working in meter, and the hardest, is to make it work for you, not to bend your work to the meter, or to form in general. The rhythm in your poem should seem natural and necessary to the reader, never forced or contrived.
by Juliet Wilson
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by Christine Swint
The soul should always stand ajar, ready to welcome the ecstatic experience.
– Emily Dickenson
Some people would raise their eyebrows and shake their heads to know that I mark up my books a lot as I read them. I guess it’s rude in a way, if you think about the next person who might pick up the book for a good read, but I can’t help it. I love to underline significant passages, even though I rarely review what I’ve underscored.
To remedy my lack of review, I’ve taken to keeping a list of memorable quotations, thoughts that ignite a response in me that needs to come out on paper. If an author’s words inspire me enough to underline them, maybe those lines warrant special treatment.
In his book The Art and Craft of Poetry, Michael J. Bugeja suggests using quotations as epigraphs, which he defines as “brief citations placed immediately above or below the title of your poem.” (Bugeja 11)
In his chapter about occasion poems, such as poems responding to specific events in history, Bugeja states that a descriptive epigraph, “even if only a date,” can “ground the reader in time or convey information that will overshadow, forebode, or otherwise color the reader’s perception of events.” (Bugeja 127)
A good example of the use of epigraph is Leilani Hall’s poem “Random Communication”. Hall begins with a dedication to her friend, Joyce Inman, and then follows with a quote in Spanish from Pablo Neruda’s poem, “Oda con un lamento.” Throughout the poem there are references to lines of poetry by Robert Creely, CD Wright, and reference material from the encyclopedia, all of which Hall cites in the notes section of her collection, Swimming the Witch. (If you missed Jessica’s review of Swimming the Witch, you can read it here.)
The Internet is a great source of quotations. Here’s a list to get you started:
The Quotations Page
Bartelby
Quoteland
Quoteworld
Brainyquote
Quotegarden
Cool Quotes
I’ll leave you with one of the recent quotes I’ve copied into my notebook, taken from Creative Meditation and Visualization by David Fontana. In describing how ancient Greek sculptors viewed their work he says, for him, ” … the stone was ready to disclose the divine image, provided he could become one with the stone and allow himself to become the instrument for this magical transformation.” (Fontana 17)
Do you have a quote that has inspired you to write a poem? What are your thoughts about keeping track of quotes and referring to them as a source of inspiration? Have you ever written a poem that disagrees with another author’s thoughts? If you have a quote you’d like to share, write it in the comments section, and tell us your source.
Bugeja , Michael J. (1994). The Art and Craft of Poetry. Cincinnati: Writer’s Digest Books.
Fontana , David. (2007). Creative Meditation and Visualization. London: Watkins Publishing.
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read write poem news- read write poem napowrimo anthology
June 20, 2010 | 1:36 pmThe Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Anthology is still in production. Selection, placement, layout and copyediting are taking longer than anticipated. Thank you for your patience. I hope to have the piece completed in July. For those who have emailed asking if they can be included, the May 7 deadline for submission of work stands. Those who met that deadline will be included. Please check the post on this site listing who I received submissions from by that date. If you submitted your work by the May 7 deadline in accordance with our guidelines and your name is not listed, send an email to info (at) readwritepoem (dot) org.
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- ‘underlife’ tour at january gill o’neil’s blog
April 20, 2010 | 8:11 pmJanuary Gill O’Neil’s virtual book tour has moved to her site and is underway now. Check out the lineup at Poet Mom.
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thank you and farewell As of May 1, 2010, Read Write Poem is no longer active.
In late May, an anthology featuring work from those who completed the Read Write Poem NaPoWriMo Challenge will be published here and on issuu.com.
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