Meter in Poetry, a la Shmoop.
If we told you to watch for iambs<>, trochees<>, spondees<>,
anapests<> and dactyls<>...
...you might cover your head with your hands and run screaming for the nearest shelter...
...hoping against hope that none of them are hungry.
But, in fact, these "fantastic five" are nothing more than types of poetic "feet."
And those feet?
They help add rhythm and meter to a line of poetry.
Oh yeah... it's not just jazz musicians who need to lay down a funky beat.
Poetry is big on beauty, and ideas, and feelings, sure... but in many cases, it also relies
on meter to evoke a certain response from the reader.
During poetry's humble beginnings...
...meter was introduced not so much to make poems sing-songy...
...but to simply help remember the dang things.
Which way is easier to remember what you need to get at the grocery store?
A list like this?
Or a poem like this:
The milk is gone And yogurt, too
I need some Dawn And a new shampoo
We're low on rye The eggs are out
Could use some pie And sauerkraut.
Catchy, no?
And it's not just because the poem rhymes.
It's because there is a natural flow... a rhythm... to the words.
Let's take a look at a version of our shopping poem that is lacking in rhythm.
The milk is gone And somebody polished off the last of the
yogurt, too I need to get some Dawn
And shampoo We're running low on our rye
The eggs were eaten this morning and so they're just about out
Since we don't have any dessert on hand it would be nice to stock up on pie
And we should also probably get sauerkraut.
Still rhymes.
But yikes.
Probably not something you'd see come out of poet laureate.
Meter is absent in free verse poetry, but there is still rhythm.
Not every line needs to have a certain number of syllables...
...and you can switch up where you stress certain words...
...but even free verse makes you feel as if there is some kind of music infused into the
language.
Try playing around with meter yourself, and see what happens.
If all else fails, at least you won't run out of sauerkraut.