It seems
The poetic forms
Outnumber the norms
Of rhythm, pace and meter
As if meeting an old acquaintance
But didn’t want to meet her
I prefer the Iamb
With fingers counting ten
Thus, with the joy of every line
I count them all again
The Etheree
Confuses me
It takes so long to get there
With but one line of ten
And then my eager fingers
Don’t get to count again
Then there are the echoes
of lines that slip and slide
as somewhere in their mystery
a hidden rhyme abides
Thus, I count, and scream and write
Pour word concrete into forms
Knowing that when left alone
My dreams will slowly turn to stone.
John G. Lawless
©7/10/2023
Today I feel iambic! I would say
of all the meters, I like it the best.
An iamb starts with some soft sound to say
then ev'ry second syllable is stressed.
Trochees likewise, alternate their stresses;
even-numbered syllables are muted.
Nowhere near as popular (my guess is) -
Trochee fans, though, fervently dispute it.
Feet are the units of meter - such fun!
Dactyls have syllables STRESSED/, un-/, and un-.
"T'was the Night Before Christmas" is in Anapest:
that's a foot with three syllables: un-/, un-/, and
STRESSED.
The meter is the pattern of the beats within a line
"Iambic" and "Heptameter" describe this line just fine.
Anapestic Tetrameter: four anapests;
and the best part of THIS lecture series? No tests!
Trimeter has three feet
Tetrameter has just four feet
Pentameter adds one foot, making five
Hexameter adds one: six feet in this beehive
Heptameter has seven feet, but now it's getting late;
and so I'll close with this (you may have guessed):
Octameter has eight!
written 1 July 2023
As to poems with cadent feet,
in tapping to an old-style pace,
the pulsing verses gladly meet,
and forward line by line advance,
with elegance and charming grace,
through steps of iamb and trochee,
to show a love, make sadness flee,
or send a message and seed sow
with voice that sets a poet free
across the seas where the winds blow
10.24.22
A trochee,
Dum-da,
is used by a poet
tho' very few know it;
a tro-chee is
self-referential.
An iamb,
da-Dum,
to confuse or amuse
or generally abuse;
pronounced i-amb,
is instead a trochee.
A spondee,
Dum-Dum,
is like a black hole;
somewhat hokey,
pronounced spon-dee,
is always a trochee.
A dactyl,
Dum-da-da,
like the anapest
from Budapest,
pronounced dac-tyl,
is also trochee.
And an anapest,
da-da-Dum,
as I understand,
in another fun factyl,
pronounced an-a-pest,
is a dactyl!
Here this?
rise(iamb,anapest)
meters
TWO
TWO
meters
fall(trochee,dactyl)
in my poem they do sit
each the others opposite;
a foot is two syllables long,
lines of them make up my song
any such line..is fine
mono,di,tri..1,2,3
tetra,penta,hexa..4,5,6
hepta,octa..7,8
but..
if this topic still makes you yawn
just keep on with open form!
Copyright © Brian Strand | Year Posted 2012
rise(iamb,anapest)
meters
TWO
TWO
meters
fall(trochee,dactyl)
in my poem they do sit
each the others opposite;
a foot is two syllables long,
lines of them make up my song
any such line..is fine
mono,di,tri..1,2,3
tetra,penta,hexa..4,5,6
hepta,octa..7,8
but..
if this topic still makes you yawn
just keep on with open form!
Traditional poetry is written in METER, wherein the words in
any given line are read/heard in syllable groups called 'feet'.
An IAMB is a foot containing one un-emphasized syllable,
followed by a second emphasized (or 'stressed') syllable.
PENTA is the Greek prefix for five. The phrase IAMBIC PENTAMETER
refers to a poetic format in which each line contains five iambic pairs (individually, ten alternating UN-STRESSED and STRESSED syllables).
The result is a distinct but pleasant pattern that might be compared
to the sound of someone (or someTHING!) walking with a slightly
uneven gait: ... step-STEP... step-STEP... step-STEP...
††††††††††††††††††††††††††††††
An 'iamb' is a pair of syllables
that sound like zombies coming down the street;
First, one soft step and next, a step that PULLS.
(You'll know when one's around just by it's feet)
'Pentameter' is bound to stop them then -
It's found to top their footsteps off at ten!
††††††††††††††††††††††††††††††
In Hamlet’s famed soliloquy,
“To be or” (maybe) “not to be,”
He questions life – is taking breath
A better deal than choosing death?
Another quote, among a slew,
Is this: “To thine own self be true,”
A brilliant and perceptive thought
Which few obey, though most are taught.
“We are such stuff as dreams are made on”
Actors cry on stages played on,
Which refers to both the play
And also to our lives each day.
Some Shakespeare gems to celebrate
His birthday, which was on this date.
Though some believe that’s all a sham,
I don’t! Am I a fan? Iamb!
THE MOUNTAIN
~~~~~~~~~~~~
The mountain shimmers.
Morning sun.
A snowdrift glimmers.
Shadow fun.
As the sun rises,
a strong wind
blows in surprises!
Warm air kind.
No wind chill, thawing.
Snow melting.
Avalanche warning!
All daunting.
Those that did not heed?
All now dead!
How many hearts bleed?
“Sorries”, said.!
The mountain cares not!
Day after?
Frozen all forgot.
New laughter!
Life moves on, new day.
Piste? Perfect!
Skiers, ski away,
None object!
The mountain shimmers.
Morning sun.
A snowdrift glimmers.
Shadow fun.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
5-3 Definition:
A poem consisting of an odd number of quatrains (16 lines or more)
I have no idea if this form has been otherwise named if you know please advise.
Alternating lines of 5 and 3 syllables, where lines 1 and 3consist of an IAMB and an ANAPEST da-DUM da-DUM-da, lines 2 and 4 consist of a DACTYL
DUM-da-DUM
Each stanza uses individual rhyme pattern –abab
where the b-rhymes are always feminine rhyme
The first stanza is a refrain, repeated as the final stanza.
i write metric verse therefore iamb.
In the canvas of twilightish insanity
Appear pomegranate designs of passion
An intellectual dance of day flowing into night
In the sea inside skull, the heartbeats of humanity
Vibrating with rurality towards urbanity
Get oxidized in the lemon and salt of mundanity
No concern for the formality of meter and iamb
And thus blooms out the filigree of feelings
Beautiful Sylvia Plath effect revealing
They invite us to the mirror
Of our reality of current disintegration
Reeking of brutality and volcanity
Collapsing rhythm joyously spells fatality
And cheerfully grows an inanity of mentality
Eating into our diamonds of morality
You often say you will return and love
Are you afraid of the expanding emptiness
And the vitality-sapping black holes?
We do not know why profanity is considered a value
We do not know where our brutal rooms lead to
We only see green leaves dropping dead every day
__________________________________________________
25/01/2017
Word Challenge - Poetry Contest hosted by Silent One
we are drudging along
old horses pulling
candle light dinner
every day
writing sonnets in iamb-
ic pentameter to pl-
ease the lords for
daily bread and
wine evry day
under the booming je
ts an spirallin rock-
ets in the global
village they po-
st free verse
and starve
passion
metre
unit of rhythm pattern of the beats
a foot has syllables two or three
variety on accent or stress
iamb is unstressed stressed
trochee is stressed unstressed
dactyl stressed unstressed unstressed
anapest reverse of dactyl
thats all for today
history
of poetry
rhythmic structure of a verse
study of metre prosody
patterns of syllables of types
stressed syllables at regular interval
qualitative
long short short dactyl
long long spondee in dead classics
alexandrine twelve syllables in french
five characters in chinese all rules then
people had lot of time to spare
sequence of feet is a metre too
stressed and unstressed like people
five iambic feet are iambic pentameter
paradise lost and sonnets
trochee is stressed unstressed reverse of iamb then
spondee anapest dactyl amphibrach pyrrhic
metric cousins
iamb in two anapest in three common modern english
unrhymed iambic penta is blank verse
bill and milton liked it rhymed pair of lines in
iambic is heroic couplet now for humor
Is this the world that was so young
and fresh and fair but yesterday?
From leafy bows the robin sung
Is this the world that was so young?
Wild bees upon the clover swung
And grove and field with bloom were gay
Is this the world that was so young
and fresh and fair but yesterday?
Is this the world that was so young
and fresh and fair but yesterday?
Sere leaves beneath our feet are flung
Is this the world that was so young?
As if wild hands spectre wrung
Hither and thither, sobbing, sway
Is this the world that was so young
and fresh and fair but yesterday?
+++
October 9, 2014
Form: Triolet (Iamb Tetrameter)
Dr. Ram Mehta
Second place win
Contest: Structured Forms Iamb Verse III by Giorgio V.
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