Metrical anomalies

[milo]

Only among formalist poets can it be said that there is a rule of three. In this age of free verse, it should be clear that there are no rules. My effort to find a synthesis between free verse and metered poetry is certainly a legitimate thing for me to do; and since most of the feet in my poetry are iambs, it is fair to say that I am writing in iambic meter. Judson Jerome -- the person I learned more from than anyone else -- estimated that about 40% of the feet in the canon of great poetry are variant feet, and my variant feet come out to about 30% or 35%.

Here is my article on scansion in which I analyze that line by Shakespeare and also analyze Timothy Steele's scansion method: http://www.poemtree.com/articles/Scansion.htm

I owe a lot to Frost for writing "Mowing". He is doing in that poem what I want to do in my own writing, and he shows us that it can work. There are more iambs in that poem than anapests, so it can't be called anapestic pentameter; it is, in fact, iambic pentameter with variants. It turns out, by the way, that there are lines with only ten syllables; and I'm glad of that, because it further proves my point. Frost is showing us that it isn't necessary to be rigid in order to write beautiful poetry. A line with ten syllables will read as more succinct, and such lines are good for making a point. Lines that stretch to 12 or 13 syllables are more languid and good for descriptive purposes. There is an organic quality to our language, and Frost is showing us that.

I looked at "Home Burial" again, and the number of lines that go to 11 syllables are less than I said, perhaps 10%. Even so, Frost is showing us that it isn't necessary to be rigid.

The rule of three is not a rule of writing it is a rule of scansion that helps understand meter.

The reason it exists is that English is a cadence based language. Trying to speak 3 hard syllables or 3 soft syllables in succession forces the reader to promote or demote depending on several things.

Once again, you may want to find a comfortable time to stop speaking and start listening as you have no clue what you are talking about and it is unlikely you will learn if you dont pay attention.

As for Mowing, it is neither anapaestic pentameter nor iambic pentameter, it is written in varying meter. There are several reasons for this, but the most important takeaway for you should be that people can write in different meters as you don't seem to understand that.

[Caleb Murdock]

I hear a good deal of laying-down of rules, but you asked for opinion, and you have it. For some reason, I find your posts uncomfortable; it may be me. But what seems to happen, is that you end up quoting yourself. Surely, if you have a general problem, it would be better to express it in general terms, and if examples are useful, find them in the poems of well-known writers, or people posting here. Then when your problem is resolved in general, you can apply what you have learnt to your own work.

You put up something with an anapaest among the iambs. Milo told you he didn't think this a good trick. You then mysteriously laid your hand on exactly the same stuff, from Frost. You seem satisfied with the answers to your own questions. But it may just be me, of course. No need to reply.

I am a bit of a know-it-all, and I'm aware of that, and I'm also aware that it makes people uncomfortable. But I'm certainly not the only know-it-all on this forum. I have a tendency to push the envelope, and that also makes people uncomfortable.

There are lots of aspects of poetry where I have uncertainties, but I don't have uncertainties in the area of scansion and meter. I understand those things quite well. I'm not going to pretend not to know what I know. So when I come on a forum where someone says "you can't put a three-syllable foot in a line of iambic poetry", and I know that that is ridiculous, I'm going to say so.

As I said somewhere else, I use my own poems as examples because I'm more interested in my own poetry than anyone else's -- and a forum like this is the place to display one's poetry. Also, it takes quite a bit of time to read poem after poem of other people's work in order to find examples -- especially when there are examples from my own work that I'm already familiar with.

---

Once again, you may want to find a comfortable time to stop speaking and start listening as you have no clue what you are talking about and it is unlikely you will learn if you dont pay attention.

Milo, stop talking down to me. I'm not here to learn things I already know.

NOW: I gave an example in my first post which represents an area where I feel some uncertainty -- and I'm talking about that fifth line that seems to go to six syllables. Why don't you address what I said there instead of playing this one-upmanship.

[milo]

I hear a good deal of laying-down of rules, but you asked for opinion, and you have it. For some reason, I find your posts uncomfortable; it may be me. But what seems to happen, is that you end up quoting yourself. Surely, if you have a general problem, it would be better to express it in general terms, and if examples are useful, find them in the poems of well-known writers, or people posting here. Then when your problem is resolved in general, you can apply what you have learnt to your own work.

You put up something with an anapaest among the iambs. Milo told you he didn't think this a good trick. You then mysteriously laid your hand on exactly the same stuff, from Frost. You seem satisfied with the answers to your own questions. But it may just be me, of course. No need to reply.

I am a bit of a know-it-all, and I'm aware of that, and I'm also aware that it makes people uncomfortable. But I'm certainly not the only know-it-all on this forum. I have a tendency to push the envelope, and that also makes people uncomfortable.

There are lots of aspects of poetry where I have uncertainties, but I don't have uncertainties in the area of scansion and meter. I understand those things quite well. I'm not going to pretend not to know what I know. So when I come on a forum where someone says "you can't put a three-syllable foot in a line of iambic poetry", and I know that that is ridiculous, I'm going to say so.

you may want to stop and re-read the line. What I said is that anapaests are not acceptable substitution in IP because they are not. you can put whatever feet you want anywhere you want but that won't make it good and it won't make it IP

As I said somewhere else, I use my own poems as examples because I'm more interested in my own poetry than anyone else's -- and a forum like this is the place to display one's poetry. Also, it takes quite a bit of time to read poem after poem of other people's work in order to find examples -- especially when there are examples from my own work that I'm already familiar with.

---

Once again, you may want to find a comfortable time to stop speaking and start listening as you have no clue what you are talking about and it is unlikely you will learn if you dont pay attention.

Milo, stop talking down to me. I'm not here to learn things I already know.

NOW: I gave an example in my first post which represents an area where I feel some uncertainty -- and I'm talking about that fifth line that seems to go to six syllables. Why don't you address what I said there instead of playing this one-upmanship.

There is no sense addressing things when you don't listen

You don't have a clue what metric poetry is, how to write it or how to read it.

While it is possible to write in any metric feet in any order, that is what we call free verse. if you would like to write in metric verse you need to learn some basics first. A nice place to start might be to learn things like the rule of three so you don't look foolish when you are attempting basic scansion on Shakespeare.

Then next thing you might wish to learn is that Many poets, Robert Frost included, wrote in meters other than iambic pentameter. They are years ahead of you. until you can master the basics, it's best not to go trying advanced concepts.

Hope that helped.

[billy]

that's the problem i see, you're not actually a know it all, i get the impression you're a "know a little" a bit like meself really though i do realise i need to learn a lot more. your examples don't hold too much water, i went to your scansion page and indeed it too holds little water.
you say push the envelope i call it doing something different. and you seem to be doing it differently but calling it the same thing....i know lets not use an iamb in a line of poetry but we can still call it a line of iambic. i can't remember where but you said formalists require at least 3 iambs for a line to be iambic. 3 out of five seems right it's a majority; were something else a majority such as spondee shouldn't it be called a line of spondeic poetry? it don't make sense what you're stating as some kind of fact. of course the envelope needs to be pushed. but don't try and claim your still working within the bounds of a given form.

[Truerenigma]

I would have to say that I agree with everyone on this thread. There are many ways to vary lines, rhythm, and meter. And there are a few different scansion techniques and methods. The rule of three is a solid method for poets and readers alike, and will probably help you find the most natural way to arrange a line--at least in my experience. Scanning foot by foot is useful to look at the different tricks the masters used for effect--volume, speed, sense, sound, etc.--and to help you understand modulation, and learn just how much a syllable can change depending on what's around it. I use both, and for me one would be useless without the other.

In a poem that is predominately IP it is possible to vary the rhythm and meter without disrupting the normative meter overmuch. Whether or not the varied lines--especially if they contain three-beat feet or less than four iambs--should be called IP is an old argument not really worth getting onto IMO. The only question that really matters is whether or not it works. That can only be decided on a poem by poem, line by line, foot by foot basis--even if the line contains only five iambs and nothing else. There are methods that have withstood the true test--the test of time-- that were used used in some of the classics. We cannot not duplicate them. We can, however, achieve similar effects though study and practice. We can also develop and improve our own ears and methods by gaining further understanding of past successes. We can aspire to them, but we cannot insist a line is good, or metrically sound, or even would have worked then--much less today--simply because it contains the same variations a master used ages ago in a particular line.

An anapest didn't work because anapests work in IP. And changes in meter and rhythm aren't anomalies. And, if a line is difficult for you to scan, that doesn't make it anomalous either. They worked for the /poem/ (meter aside) because they were right for the poem, and the artist knew it. End of story.

I'm sure milo would concede that changes and variations in meter and rhythm have been successful in the past, in many different forms. But he has put a lot of time and effort into helping beginners here learn about meter, rhythm, and scansion; he isn't going to let others get confused by compromising on the very definition of IP just to suit another's fancy.

[milo]

I'm sure milo would concede that changes and variations in meter and rhythm have been successful in the past, in many different forms. But he has put a lot of time and effort into helping beginners here learn about meter, rhythm, and scansion; he isn't going to let others get confused by compromising on the very definition of IP just to suit another's fancy.

I have probably experimented with deviations in standard meter within metrical verse more than most writers you would ever read. I may have even been successful more than the average. What I don't do is call them by what they are not. Speaking of which, I believe I still have a copy of an old sonnet with a little metrical deviation somewhere around . . . here:

The Prisoner

Oh, won’t you please stop
writing, she says as she looks
at her feet, twists her thumbs like a top,
the world, already, is too full with books
as the sink’s full of pots,
then she stops and she puts
her hands on her hips
and she pouts up her lips
and begins to recite my do’s and do nots
like the fireplace, still choking on cinders and soots
though by the looks of the lawn it’s been months since it took
a flame to keep warm
and would it harm
me to look away from the screen for a minute to talk
after all, no one reads, no one hears the click of the lock.


now, perhaps if our new metrical master can explain all the deviations in meter here . . .

[Brownlie]

I'm sure milo would concede that changes and variations in meter and rhythm have been successful in the past, in many different forms. But he has put a lot of time and effort into helping beginners here learn about meter, rhythm, and scansion; he isn't going to let others get confused by compromising on the very definition of IP just to suit another's fancy.

I have probably experimented with deviations in standard meter within metrical verse more than most writers you would ever read. I may have even been successful more than the average. What I don't do is call them by what they are not. Speaking of which, I believe I still have a copy of an old sonnet with a little metrical deviation somewhere around . . . here:

The Prisoner

Oh, won’t you please stop
writing, she says as she looks
at her feet, twists her thumbs like a top,
the world, already, is too full with books
as the sink’s full of pots,
then she stops and she puts
her hands on her hips
and she pouts up her lips
and begins to recite my do’s and do nots
like the fireplace, still choking on cinders and soots
though by the looks of the lawn it’s been months since it took
a flame to keep warm
and would it harm
me to look away from the screen for a minute to talk
after all, no one reads, no one hears the click of the lock.


now, perhaps if our new metrical master can explain all the deviations in meter here . . .

I've seen that poem before.

[milo]

I'm sure milo would concede that changes and variations in meter and rhythm have been successful in the past, in many different forms. But he has put a lot of time and effort into helping beginners here learn about meter, rhythm, and scansion; he isn't going to let others get confused by compromising on the very definition of IP just to suit another's fancy.

I have probably experimented with deviations in standard meter within metrical verse more than most writers you would ever read. I may have even been successful more than the average. What I don't do is call them by what they are not. Speaking of which, I believe I still have a copy of an old sonnet with a little metrical deviation somewhere around . . . here:

The Prisoner

Oh, won’t you please stop
writing, she says as she looks
at her feet, twists her thumbs like a top,
the world, already, is too full with books
as the sink’s full of pots,
then she stops and she puts
her hands on her hips
and she pouts up her lips
and begins to recite my do’s and do nots
like the fireplace, still choking on cinders and soots
though by the looks of the lawn it’s been months since it took
a flame to keep warm
and would it harm
me to look away from the screen for a minute to talk
after all, no one reads, no one hears the click of the lock.


now, perhaps if our new metrical master can explain all the deviations in meter here . . .

I've seen that poem before.

It is one I've frequently leaned on to teach metrical deviation though you would think I would write some fresh material.

[Brownlie]

I have probably experimented with deviations in standard meter within metrical verse more than most writers you would ever read. I may have even been successful more than the average. What I don't do is call them by what they are not. Speaking of which, I believe I still have a copy of an old sonnet with a little metrical deviation somewhere around . . . here:

The Prisoner

Oh, won’t you please stop
writing, she says as she looks
at her feet, twists her thumbs like a top,
the world, already, is too full with books
as the sink’s full of pots,
then she stops and she puts
her hands on her hips
and she pouts up her lips
and begins to recite my do’s and do nots
like the fireplace, still choking on cinders and soots
though by the looks of the lawn it’s been months since it took
a flame to keep warm
and would it harm
me to look away from the screen for a minute to talk
after all, no one reads, no one hears the click of the lock.


now, perhaps if our new metrical master can explain all the deviations in meter here . . .

I've seen that poem before.

It is one I've frequently leaned on to teach metrical deviation though you would think I would write some fresh material.

Well, you know what you're up to, this has been a good thread so far. Very amusing and elucidating.