using other forms besides iambic pentameter.

[Brownlie]

It actually alternates 3 - 4 - 3 which is pretty uncommon for a villanelle though 4 - 3- 4 is common enough. I always called this anapestic trimeter/tetrameter but with a common iamb sub to start and foreshortened. Recently I have heard some refer to it as amphabrics and though it lines up nicely, I am not sold.

Here is what I know of writing in meter (summed up):

1. Modern English verse is written with 4 metric choices: iambic, trochaic, anapestic, dactyllic.
2. Following are conscious acceptable subs: spondees, Pyrrhics (rare), iambs, trochees
3. Everything else is for metric analysis /not/ for writing.

Now these rules are probably not 100% accurate, but they are so close as to be usable

Thank you man, I should be paying you.

I should point out before someone "sharpshoots" me that there are some regular meters (Alexandrines, Sprung meter) that are consistent usages of regular substituions. I don't think they should be discussed here, I just know someone is going bring it up.

Also, pay sounds nice . . .

Maybe someday I can repay your efforts. I think its important to point out that methods of scansion vary. In most schools all you will see is the macron and breve. I know your mentor may disagree with the simplicity of that system.