I went to a Poetry School workshop in London last Saturday with the celebrated, award-winning poet Sean O’Brien, and found myself jotting down a number of things he said that I thought I might usefully share with readers on Write Out Loud.

The first thing that struck me – and will no doubt strike a chord with the champions of rhyme and metre here on this site – was his view that “we can go too far in the direction of being ‘natural’ in poetry”. [By that, I took him to mean free verse]. He added that it was “useful at times to have rhetorical devices like ballads, songs, stories”. O’Brien said that “one of the effects of rhyme should be to make you think it is true while you are reading it. Rhyme is a very specialised, and rather dangerous, moral enforcer.” Another tip was on the use of repetition: “If you use repetition properly, it’s not just repetition; it accumulates meaning.”

But he also cautioned against making your meaning too plain in poetry, saying that “the imaginative reader likes to be intrigued. They don’t want to find themselves in the car park looking at a direction sign from the council.”

The workshop was great fun, and he encouraged to us write three poems during the day. I won’t give the titles of the poems away, but of course they were all to do with time. Sean O’Brien will be repeating his workshop on Time at the International Anthony Burgess Foundation in Manchester on Saturday 22 February http://www.poetryschool.com/courses-workshops/face-to-face/it-s-about-time--manchester.php

I like his metaphor about the parking sign! It's inspired me to try out reading a few things at open mics that I wouldn't normally air.

Bring back proper English alliterative verse, like wot Beowulf wrote, say I... down with new fangled foreign rhyme stuff.

My views on this are a matter of record.
http://www.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=32704

There highest level in all poetry is the exact right word in the exact right place. rhymed poetry adds the exact resonance of sound.

Half-sounds never really do it. Here are two following stanzas from Francis Thompson which (in my opinion) go some way to demonstrate what I mean.


ODE TO THE SETTING SUN

PRELUDE

The wailful sweetness of the violin
Floats down the hushed waters of the wind,
The heart-strings of the throbbing harp begin
To long in aching music. Spirit pined,

In wafts that poignant sweetness drifts until
The wounded soul ooze sadness. The red sun,
A bubble of fire, drops slowly towards the hill,
While on bird prattles that the day is done.


I think the first stanza (slightly) fails because of the differing vowel sounds of `wind` and `pined`. (The poet just about gets away with it by making `pined` enjamb the next stanza, but its imperfect)…The other stanza is perfect.

Rhyme is one of the tools of the poet, along with rhythm, assonance, juxtaposition, imagery, argument, controlled chance, shape, language, space, allusion, syntax normal or unorthodox and probably a few other tools and techniques I've not mentioned. Cut & paste is a tool; collage is a tool.

You can choose to use them or not. I very rarely use rhyme myself though I hope I'm aware of the sound of my poetry enough to make it interesting. But I also use space and juxtaposition, concision of language, cut and paste and other techniques. I might not be everyone's cup of tea; certainly not if you think Francis Thompson is a good poet.

But it's all poetry and you can use whatever tools you identify with most. Rhyme is one of them; so is open form; so is surrealism. Arguments about what is and is not 'real' poetry are frankly pointless.

Wow, what's going on? I find myself strongly agreeing with Steven lol. J/k in tone of course, but I completely agree with your statement.

In reference to Harry, I would differentiate between where a poet fails in the use of rhyme and one that deliberately and skillfully chooses to use slant or half rhyme. The former can be due to many things;

a lack of knowledge when it comes to the syllabic nature of the language and significant differences in the number of syllables between lines (causing the rhyme to miss).

or

a poor understanding of sound (a poor ear)

or again through a misunderstanding of how the language works and the dreaded wrenched-rhyme. Etc etc

Well executed half rhyme is often, more subtle, much harder for the poet to successfully bring about, and is often much more unexpected. For these reasons, I often find half/slant rhyme to be be more pleasing.

Of course the difficulty and issue with any rhyme, end, internal, eye-rhyme, or slant rhyme etc, is making sure it is neither painfully obvious or worse yet, that the poet has threw meaning out in order to fit rhyme in.

The worst poetry imo is that where the poet or poem has no idea what it is, with the poem changing subject, or nature, style or trajectory...all to shoe-horn in some clunky rhyme.

Rhyme used at its best, for me affords a poem when read out - a consistent meaning, style, direction etc, where you can't hear the rhymes coming or expect them too easily. At it's best, it should tend to be a great musical addition, with meaning and sound seamlessly merging/interacting, as though the poet was just fortunate that the rhymes fitting the task appeared at hand. Like a Swan, there might be hard-work under the surface, but on the surface everything should seem placid - easy even.

In fact any poetic device that is cleverly executed and still made to look easy, when it isn't - that's a sign of great skill.

P.S

Good poetry is good poetry in any form.

I am fascinated by the contributions made by Chris about skill or failure in the use of rhyme and Steven about what I interpret as the `anything goes` approach.

I`ve presented an example of what I mean by rhyme and half-rhyme. If Chris and Steven would present (from modern poetry`s copious treasury)actual examples to illustrate the points and comments they make, then I am sure - with those examples before us - that we would have the makings of the kind of evidence necessary to form a sound judgement. (and also the makings of a cracking thread to get everyone going)

Come on lads - it`s a challenge!

It's not an anything goes approach. It's an anything goes as long as it works approach. Unfortunately, what works for me doesn't neccessarily work for you so examples would be moot. When people ate still arguing over the relative merits of Picasso & Cezanne, I don't see how we're going to solve the argument over modernism and traditiinalism in poetry anytime soon. Let's just leave it at I like noodles and you prefer potatoes. Nothing wrong with either foodstuff; they're just different.

ww.writeoutloud.net/public/blogentry.php?blogentryid=41147

I've just posted an example of a poem of mine on the blogs here not out of ego but to illustrate what I mean.

I suspect it won't work for Harry; but it might for others.

It's an interesting discussion Harry.

First of all I'd like to say I have a lot of time for what Steven has said in his two prior posts. I don't think 'anything goes' is what he does, or what poets typically do when writing in modern or relatively modern styles. I think 'anything goes, so long as it works for the poet' is a good way to put it.

Poetry, subjectively either works or it does not, whatever the poetic device used or not used, with each poet opting for differing tools. So long as the end result is pleasing to the poet and a number of other people - so long as it works!

The right tool for the right job, if it works, anything beyond that is merely academic.

Quote Harry
I`ve presented an example of what I mean by rhyme and half-rhyme. If Chris and Steven would present (from modern poetry`s copious treasury) actual examples to illustrate the points and comments they make, then I am sure - with those examples before us - that we would have the makings of the kind of evidence necessary to form a sound judgement
Unquote

I think a number of problems are contained in the above;

a) it presents a presumption that is both wrong and also a false dichotomy.

Slant rhyme is unequivically not new or modern, it is as old as rhyme itself. One poet who particularly enjoyed slant rhyme was Emily Dickinson, not what you would call modern.

So slant rhyme is not modern. Given that it is not modern, this could not possibly be a traditional versus modern poetry debate.

b) the above further implies that I am a proponent of modern poetry, yet I have given no indication either way. Also, the false dichotomy implies that I am against traditional poetry via implication, again I gave no indication of this.

The truth is I greatly admire good poetry, I care less how that is achieved. For this reason I love lots of traditional and modern poetry.

c) I think turning this discussion into an either or, or versus debate would be an error.

If good rhymed poetry, that includes differing types of rhyme (including slant rhyme, eye rhyme, head rhyme, internal rhyme etc) is under-represented in the poetry world because gate keepers of taste do not like it, and therfore disproportionately bar its publication...if that happens and ai think it does - I disagree with that!

If that is happening, then we suffer because we are stylistically being given a narrower view. Of course this does not mean that there isn't some very good modern poems, including non rhymed poems, which by the way are two differing things. Just because a poem is rhymed, it doesn't mean it is traditional, and modern poetry is not modern - simply by the virtue that little of it rhymes.

Anyway, if we are missing out on quality poems/poetry, on the basis of 'style', then that means, we must be seeing too much of one type or more types of poetry and maybe also seeing some of that which is not to such a high standard - relatively speaking.

That is the issue that needs addressing, does it not?

Otherwise we end up with the same shopworn arguments don't we? We fall into the trap of this being yet another versus argument, which I think totally misses the real issue. One on which I think all of us might agree. I really think we would all agree on this. I would certainly like to see a much broader range of poetry published, including a lot more poems using rhyme with or without meter, metered poems, poems using differing forms and other poetic devices.

d) You say that Steven or myself may meet your challenge. But you say this is to be judged, even going so far as to use the word 'evidence'. That would imply that we are dealing in the empirical and objective, but as we know, that is simply not the case. Poetry is subjective and unlike sport or science there isn't really a right or wrong answer, no introduction, method and conclusion.

You have stated that you love rhyme, that you find it more pleasing than slant rhyme, so I am reminded of the phrase;

A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still.

Nothing I offer is likely to change your mind, not that there is anything wrong with that at all, such is taste and subjectivity.

The point though is that, The challenge feels a little bit (forgive the expression) rigged. What you like will differ from what either myself or Steven or in fact anyone will like. I can show you examples - but there is no result to be found. Reaching a result via evidence is a false premise.

So with all that said, I will, possibly later today or tomorrow, still offer examples of slant rhyme, ones that are very pleasing to me. I don't think that relates to a challenge, as I reject that premise in this context. But in the interests of a nice discussion, decency and to afford you the same courtesy that you kindly extended to us - it is only right to do the same.

P.S

You spoke about the right word, or perfect word in the perfect order. That of course is the gold standard. Where I would disagree is in what you seem to think this equates to - namely, rhyme.

I think the above is a non sequitur. The perfect words in the perfect order in one poem will not involve any rhyme, in the next poem it will. It is about the right tool, for the right job.

To suggest otherwise imo is akin to suggesting that a hammer is the best tool for all jobs - clearly it's not.

None of which is to knock any tool/poetic device. Rhyme is wonderful when intelligently and thoughtfully allied to the right meaning. I very much agree - it can deliver the perfect payload of sound...it can be truely wonderous.

Most of the poetry I can recite by heart has a stricter metre and some form of rhyme. That's the value of it for me: memorability. I guessing that many of us could recite a few lines of "Daffodils", but would be hard pressed to produce a line of "Howl". Not that I'd choose a word solely for the rhyme, it has to be the right word. I find a good way to signal the end of poem is to subvert the rhyme scheme or shave syllables from the ultimate lines. In performance it acts as a sort of brake or like the discordant notes sometimes sounded at the end of classical guitar/flamenco performances. Saves the 'dead air' effect at the end of a recital. Nobody wants to applaud to soon!

I don't really write 'for performance' so memorability isn't that important to me. I read from the text when I do perform. Apparently I do good vowel sounds... (One day I'm going to write a poem called Loose Vowels...)

I wasn't really thinking about memorising my own writing, but more generally what's absorbed into oral culture and transmitted and what gets forgotten and the prt rhyme might play in this....

Gregg`s thread is about a poet`s concern that we may have gone too far in being `natural` (using un-rhymed free verse?)in poetry.

I still think - to adequately ponder on such a statement - that we should have before us actual examples of both kinds from the best types of the
past. In this way we can compare the `natural` and the traditional rhymed `un-free`.

Instead of just stating that we prefer either kind, we will have actual examples so that we can go into detail about why we prefer them.

Come on lads, let`s get down to the nitty-gritty.

Actually Harry it related to rhyme and meter and forms, not just rhyme. That said the notion was about going to far, and by that they meant that poetry using meter, rhyme and form was still useful and relevant.

I have already agreed that this is a reasonable and relevant argument, that I agree with. Somehow you are misrepresenting the original post as;

free verse versus rhyme - which it isn't and then also claiming this is modern versus traditional which in the terms you express...again isn't so.

The poet in question is just one poet with one opinion, not the be all and end all or arbiter of all, but in any regard - they were not saying what you are Harry, that was NOT their argument/position. On which note I am somewhat confused as to what it is you would like us to do. Threads change, flow, move from point to point. Previously you had asked me to provide examples of slant rhyme, as though this was modern poetry and versus or against rhyme. But now you seem to have gone back to the original post.

So do you still see slant rhyme as modern? Do you still want examples of it?

You seem to be putting me in the modern camp, not sure why? You seem to want a dichotomy. You seem to be pointing me towards a trench opposite from yourself which you would like me to occupy, so that we may fire at one another and be diametrically opposed. But I am not diametrically opposed. I am not against traditional poetry, just as I am not against modern poetry. The whole versus is too black and white and generates more heat than light.

Added to which I completely reject the ground rules you would like to put in place. Rhyme does NOT equal traditional. Free or blank verse does NOT equal modern. Alliterative saxon verse is old English poetry and it does NOT rhyme - is that traditional enough for you? What about Milton's Paradise Lost? What about Milton's comment upon rhyme? That is 1650 or so. I take it we are not terming that modern poetry?

Yet we have modern poetry that does rhyme, we have spoken word and def jam poetry that uses lots and lots of rhyme. So how do we define modern and traditional poetry? Can we really just speak of rhyme or no rhyme? If you still think so - explain how - given the above evidence. Again I say, can't we simply agree that the real issue is a limited scope of poetry being accepted by publishers/gatekeepers of taste?

Surely we can do that and dispense with the need for a protracted debate?

Can't we simply say/agree that too little good rhymed, metered and rhymed, blank verse or differing forms of poetry is accepted on the basis of narrow taste? And say this is disagreeable? If you really still want examples, well, not sure how or why, but let me know (precisely) what you want and hopefully we will get there in the next post.

I really can't help but hope and think that the real issue is what I mention though. We want to hear all types of poetry and not be limited or denied the flavour we like.

P.S

If I didn't appreciate rhyme, meter or form I would not use it as often as I do, neither would I be able to appreciate your verse - which is most enjoyable and satisfying. On a separate side note to this discussion, I also greatly enjoy the beauty of your language when you invoke intelligent design. I don't need to agree with you philosophically in order to appreciate that...on which note;

Quote
Ptolemy - Almagest
I know that I am mortal by nature and ephemeral, but when I trace at my pleasure the windings to and fro of the heavenly bodies, I no longer touch earth with my feet. I stand in the presence of Zeus himself and take my fill of ambrosia.
Unquote

Beautiful yes?

I can find almost nothing to disagree with in Chris` comments, But I still feel that merely comparing the various types of poetry can help us
to discriminate the differences in the two types of poetry.

For instance on a `STARRY` LEVEL, What are the differences between Chris` quote and Byron below?

Ptolemy - Almagest
I know that I am mortal by nature and ephemeral, but when I trace at my pleasure the windings to and fro of the heavenly bodies, I no longer touch earth with my feet. I stand in the presence of Zeus himself and take my fill of ambrosia.



Byron

She walks in beauty, like the night
Of cloudless climes and starry skies;
And all that's best of dark and bright
Meet in her aspect and her eyes:
Thus mellowed to that tender light
Which heaven to gaudy day denies.

Oh, all right then, I`ll do it myself.

1…The first is a piece of poetical prose (probably translated)

2…It has gravitas…in that it deals with Zeus (God) , Ambrosia (the God`s sustenance of eternal youth) and a sort of being taken up into such an exalted company as someone who is merely `ephemeral`. Its faults (IMO) are the words `trace` and `windings` and the narrowing of the collective multitudinous spectacle of a starry
night into individual `heavenly bodies`. (the `to and fro` gives it something of an – anti-wonderous – feel of boredom) The style of the prose is quite ordinary and doesn`t do justice to the exaltation of the theme.


In the second: (IMO) night-time `cloudless climes and starry skies` are (not even poetically) indicative of female beauty as `she walks`. It`s over-kill as applied (even poetically) to a lone individual woman. `dark and bright` are too contrastive to be mellowed
into the inappropriate touch and visual `tender light` it`s poetically clumsy. `Gaudy` sticks out like a sore thumb in this kind of a supposedly `smooth` poem.

This single stanza only `works` by the confident ease of the rhyme scheme.

The first one works cause it's good prose. The second one works cause it's goid verse. Both writers are good writers. Wow. What a revelation. Good writers write well. Next thing we'll discover that fire burns and water's wet.
Rhyme is not better than blank verse; blank verse is not better than rhyme. Etc.
Depends on what you're after. Really.

Not Waving but Drowning by Stevie Smith

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.

.......

Sure one rhyme in the middle stanza, but other than that, no rhyme, consonance - repetition of consonant sounds, but not vowel sounds, but no other rhyme.

I regard the above as one of the best poems ever written.

Dolor by Theodore Roethke

I have known the inexorable sadness of pencils,
Neat in their boxes, dolor of pad and paper weight,
All the misery of manilla folders and mucilage,
Desolation in immaculate public places,
Lonely reception room, lavatory, switchboard,
The unalterable pathos of basin and pitcher,
Ritual of multigraph, paper-clip, comma,
Endless duplicaton of lives and objects.
And I have seen dust from the walls of institutions,
Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,
Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium,
Dropping a fine film on nails and delicate eyebrows,
Glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.

No rhyme, again one of my favourite poems.

Not much in the way of rhyme, or what we consider conventional usage of rhyme in the poem below;

'Poem' by Simon Armitage

And if it snowed and snow covered the drive
he took a spade and tossed it to one side.
And always tucked his daughter up at night.
And slippered her the one time that she lied.

And every week he tipped up half his wage.
And what he didn't spend each week he saved.
And praised his wife for every meal she made.
And once, for laughing, punched her in the face.

And for his mum he hired a private nurse.
And every Sunday taxied her to church.
And he blubbed when she went from bad to worse.
And twice he lifted ten quid from her purse.

Here's how they rated him when they looked back:
Sometimes he did this, sometimes he did that.

A lack of rhyme in Milton's Paradise lost, far to large for me to re-print here, though of course it is regarded as a classic traditional English poem.

Not sure if you even count forms which escape rhyming couplets, but of course many forms do that and do not have our typical rhymey sound. All of Shakespeare's sonnets for example. English and Italian sonnets with their structure do not have a rhyming sound, though they do have what is termed a rhyming structure (which is different).

Haiku do not rhyme at all as an art form.

Amother classic/traditional poem without rhyme

The Eolian Harp
BY SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE


My pensive Sara! thy soft cheek reclined
Thus on mine arm, most soothing sweet it is
To sit beside our Cot, our Cot o’ergrown
With white-flowered Jasmin, and the broad-leaved Myrtle,
(Meet emblems they of Innocence and Love!)
And watch the clouds, that late were rich with light,
Slow saddening round, and mark the star of eve
Serenely brilliant (such would Wisdom be)
Shine opposite! How exquisite the scents
Snatched from yon bean-field! and the world so hushed!
The stilly murmur of the distant Sea
Tells us of silence.

And that simplest Lute,
Placed length-ways in the clasping casement, hark!
How by the desultory breeze caressed,
Like some coy maid half yielding to her lover,
It pours such sweet upbraiding, as must needs
Tempt to repeat the wrong! And now, its strings
Boldlier swept, the long sequacious notes
Over delicious surges sink and rise,
Such a soft floating witchery of sound
As twilight Elfins make, when they at eve
Voyage on gentle gales from Fairy-Land,
Where Melodies round honey-dropping flowers,
Footless and wild, like birds of Paradise,
Nor pause, nor perch, hovering on untamed wing!
O! the one Life within us and abroad,
Which meets all motion and becomes its soul,
A light in sound, a sound-like power in light,
Rhythm in all thought, and joyance everywhere—
Methinks, it should have been impossible
Not to love all things in a world so filled;
Where the breeze warbles, and the mute still air
Is Music slumbering on her instrument.

And thus, my Love! as on the midway slope
Of yonder hill I stretch my limbs at noon,
Whilst through my half-closed eyelids I behold
The sunbeams dance, like diamonds, on the main,
And tranquil muse upon tranquility:
Full many a thought uncalled and undetained,
And many idle flitting phantasies,
Traverse my indolent and passive brain,
As wild and various as the random gales
That swell and flutter on this subject Lute!

And what if all of animated nature
Be but organic Harps diversely framed,
That tremble into thought, as o’er them sweeps
Plastic and vast, one intellectual breeze,
At once the Soul of each, and God of all?

But thy more serious eye a mild reproof
Darts, O beloved Woman! nor such thoughts
Dim and unhallowed dost thou not reject,
And biddest me walk humbly with my God.
Meek Daughter in the family of Christ!
Well hast thou said and holily dispraised
These shapings of the unregenerate mind;
Bubbles that glitter as they rise and break
On vain Philosophy’s aye-babbling spring.
For never guiltless may I speak of him,
The Incomprehensible! save when with awe
I praise him, and with Faith that inly feels;
Who with his saving mercies healèd me,
A sinful and most miserable man,
Wildered and dark, and gave me to possess
Peace, and this Cot, and thee, heart-honored Maid!


Beautiful language...

Sorrow by D H Lawrence

Why does the thin grey strand
Floating up from the forgotten
Cigarette between my fingers,
Why does it trouble me?

Ah, you will understand;
When I carried my mother downstairs,
A few times only, at the beginning
Of her soft-foot malady,

I should find, for a reprimand
To my gaiety, a few long grey hairs
On the breast of my coat; and one by one
I let them float up the dark chimney.

Wilfred Owen's Anthem for Doomed Youth - the poem uses intermittent rhyme, using both free verse un-rhymed and lines of rhyme. The non rhymed lines do not take anything away from the sum of the parts, rather they add weight, add meaning to what is one of the most memorable war poems ever written.

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, –
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.


Snow by Louis Macneice

The room was suddenly rich and the great bay-window was
Spawning snow and pink roses against it
Soundlessly collateral and incompatible:
World is suddener than we fancy it.

World is crazier and more of it than we think,
Incorrigibly plural. I peel and portion
A tangerine and spit the pips and feel
The drunkenness of things being various.

And the fire flames with a bubbling sound for world
Is more spiteful and gay than one supposes -
On the tongue on the eyes on the ears in the palms of one's hands -
There is more than glass between the snow and the huge roses.

.......

Again another beautiful poem that has no rhyme.


Another beautiful classic poem that is mainly free verse unrhymed. Yes it contains a little rhyme, but it is clearly free verse on the main and it benefits from this;

Long-Legged Fly by W B Yeats

That civilization may not sink,
Its great battle lost,
Quiet the dog, tether the pony
To a distant post;
Our master Caesar is in the tent
Where the maps are spread,
His eyes fixed upon nothing,
A hand under his head.
(Like a long-legged fly upon the stream
His mind moves upon silence.)

That the topless towers be burnt
And men recall that face,
Move most gently if move you must
In this lonely place.
She thinks, part woman, three parts a child,
That nobody looks; her feet
Practise a tinker shuffle
Picked up on a street.
(Like a long-legged fly upon the stream
Her mind moves upon silence.)

That girls at puberty may find
The first Adam in their thought,
Shut the door of the Pope’s chapel,
Keep those children out.
There on that scaffolding reclines
Michael Angelo.
With no more sound than the mice make
His hand moves to and fro.
(Like a long-legged fly upon the stream
His mind moves upon silence).

......

At Grass by Philip Larkin (an all time favourite of mine - no rhyme)

The eye can hardly pick them out
From the cold shade they shelter in,
Till wind distresses tail and main;
Then one crops grass, and moves about
- The other seeming to look on -
And stands anonymous again

Yet fifteen years ago, perhaps
Two dozen distances surficed
To fable them: faint afternoons
Of Cups and Stakes and Handicaps,
Whereby their names were artificed
To inlay faded, classic Junes -

Silks at the start: against the sky
Numbers and parasols: outside,
Squadrons of empty cars, and heat,
And littered grass : then the long cry
Hanging unhushed till it subside
To stop-press columns on the street.

Do memories plague their ears like flies?
They shake their heads. Dusk brims the shadows.
Summer by summer all stole away,
The starting-gates, the crowd and cries -
All but the unmolesting meadows.
Almanacked, their names live; they

Have slipped their names, and stand at ease,
Or gallop for what must be joy,
And not a fieldglass sees them home,
Or curious stop-watch prophesies:
Only the grooms, and the grooms boy,
With bridles in the evening come.

Pike by Ted Hughes (capturing nature without rhyme)

Pike, three inches long, perfect
Pike in all parts, green tigering the gold.
Killers from the egg: the malevolent aged grin.
They dance on the surface among the flies.

Or move, stunned by their own grandeur,
Over a bed of emerald, silhouette
Of submarine delicacy and horror.
A hundred feet long in their world.

In ponds, under the heat-struck lily pads-
Gloom of their stillness:
Logged on last year’s black leaves, watching upwards.
Or hung in an amber cavern of weeds

The jaws’ hooked clamp and fangs
Not to be changed at this date:
A life subdued to its instrument;
The gills kneading quietly, and the pectorals.

Three we kept behind glass,
Jungled in weed: three inches, four,
And four and a half: fed fry to them-
Suddenly there were two. Finally one

With a sag belly and the grin it was born with.
And indeed they spare nobody.
Two, six pounds each, over two feet long
High and dry and dead in the willow-herb-

One jammed past its gills down the other’s gullet:
The outside eye stared: as a vice locks-
The same iron in this eye
Though its film shrank in death.

A pond I fished, fifty yards across,
Whose lilies and muscular tench
Had outlasted every visible stone
Of the monastery that planted them-

Stilled legendary depth:
It was as deep as England. It held
Pike too immense to stir, so immense and old
That past nightfall I dared not cast

But silently cast and fished
With the hair frozen on my head
For what might move, for what eye might move.
The still splashes on the dark pond,

Owls hushing the floating woods
Frail on my ear against the dream
Darkness beneath night’s darkness had freed,
That rose slowly toward me, watching.

Days by Philip Larkin

What are days for?
Days are where we live.
They come, they wake us
Time and time over.
They are to be happy in:
Where can we live but days?

Ah, solving that question
Brings the priest and the doctor
In their long coats
Running over the fields.

I could have picked a thousand differing poems Harry

Now you could try and beat out an explanation out of every one of them and try to explain how other poems, rhymed poems are "better". But you will never convince me, as I will never convince you.

A man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still.

I love all forms of poetry. For me it will always be about the right tool for the right job. And I say that as someone who agrees with you that meter/rhyme and form are not well enough represented in modern publishing - something that should change to afford a wider view and interest.

I close my post and my last contribution to the discussion with one final poem.
For me the most important of all my examples. This is my favourite poem of all time and it is unrhymed. Ask yourself, could this really possibly have been any better if rhymed?

Anniversaries by Andrew Motion

The fourth

Anniversary weather: I drive
under a raw sunset, the road
cramped between drifts, hedges
polished into sharp crests.

I have it by heart now;
on this day in each year
no signposts point anywhere
but east into Essex,

and so to your ward,
where snow recovers tonight
the ground I first saw lost
four winters ago.

Whatever time might bring,
all my journeys take me
back to this dazzling dark:
I watch my shadow ahead

plane across open fields,
out of my reach for ever,
but setting towards your bed
to find itself waiting there.


The first

What I remember is not
your leaving, but your not
coming back - and snow
creaking in thick trees,

burying tracks preserved
in spiky grass below.
All afternoon I watched
from the kitchen window

a tap thaw in the yard,
oozing into its stiff sack,
then harden when evening
closed with ice again.

And I am still there,
seeing your horse return
alone to the open stable,
its reins dragging behind

a trail across the plough,
a blurred riddle of scars
we could not decipher then,
and cannot heal now.


The second

I had imagined it all -
your ward, your shaved head,
your crisp scab struck there
like an ornament,

but not your stillness.
Day after day I saw
my father leaning forward
to enter it, whispering

'If you can hear me now,
squeeze my hand', till snow
melted in sunlight outside
then turned to winter again

and found him waiting still,
hearing the slow hiss
of oxygen into your mask,
and always turning to say

'Yes, I felt it then',
as if repeating the lie
had gradually made it true
for him, never for you.


The third

Three years without sight,
speech, gesture, only
the shadow of clouds
shifting across your face

then blown a world away.
What sleep was that, which
light could never break?
What spellbound country

claimed you, forbidding you
even to wake for a kiss?
If it was death,
whose hands were those

warm in my own, and whose
astonishing word was it
that day when leaving
your sunlit room I heard

'Stay; stay', and watched
your eyes flick open once,
look, refuse to recognise
my own, and turn away?


The fourth

The evening falls with snow
beginning again, halving
the trees into whiteness,
driving me with it towards

the end of another year.
What will the next one bring
that this has abandoned?
You are your own survivor,

giving me back the world
I knew, without the years
we lost. Until I forget
whatever it cannot provide

I'll always arrive like this,
having no death to mourn,
but rather the life we share
nowhere beyond your room,

our love repeating itself
like snow I watch tonight,
which spins against my window
then vanishes into the dark.

P.S

I am leaving online discussions/poetry behind Harry, but I shall read your response with interest. You can mail me any time you like. I have always enjoyed I conversations and this was no different. Oddly I actually have a lot of sympathy for your view, as I greatly enjoy rhyme...and your poetry too. See you at the Spoke :)

I should also say I found Steven's comments very agreeable, nuanced and understanding in terms of the subjectivity of our subject matter.

Best

Chris, you list a fine poem by Larkin, 'At Grass', and say alongside it, "no rhyme". Sorry to nitpick, but surely it has a very tight and consistent rhyme scheme?

I don`t really think the first one works (despite its theme) It could be the translation.

The second is good verse in the sense of sound (who better at that than Byron?) but I don`t think it`s very good poetry.

I agree with your `anything goes as long as it works`. But if it works we should be able to have a good stab at explaining why it works. (or doesn`t) This is what is needed so that we can improve our poetry Today.

I`m almost sorry I started this :)

( No I`m not :) )

It`s marvelous to see so many types
of poetry up there, but where are the
accompanying comments explaining why
they are considered good poetry...not
merely comments of the `I like this`
kind.

(I`m goin` down for my tea)

Because and this really is me out.

Analysis in the final analysis cannot tell us what is or is not good poetry Harry. Neither will it change our subjective opinions. Analysis is better used to ask differing question, which I wont go into here for fear of sparking another discussion. I leave with this;

Billy Collins

I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem's room
and feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.

My Best to you

Why is Dead Poets Society coming to mind?

I know quite a lot about poetry and I know what I like.

The Anactoria Poem

by Sappho
edited by Richard Lattimore

Some there are who say that the fairest thing seen
on the black earth is an array of horsemen;
some, men marching; some would say ships; but I say
she whom one loves best

is the loveliest. Light were the work to make this
plain to all, since she, who surpassed in beauty
all mortality, Helen, once forsaking
her lordly husband,

fled away to Troy--land across the water.
Not the thought of child nor beloved parents
was remembered, after the Queen of Cyprus
won her at first sight.

Since young brides have hearts that can be persuaded
easily, light things, palpitant to passion
as am I, remembering Anaktória
who has gone from me

and whose lovely walk and the shining pallor
of her face I would rather see before my
eyes than Lydia's chariots in all their glory
armored for battle.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/15849#sthash.0jsKTDqF.dpuf

Chris, I know you like and appreciate all kinds of poetry,but what I`m really after is a deeper going into one (any) particular kind of poem and the reasons why we might like that particular poem (including the benefit–or lack of it – in it`s being rhymed or un–rhymed).

This is a go at what I`m trying to mean.


Not Waving but Drowning by Stevie Smith

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.


The title has proved universally quotable.

The middle stanza describes the death by drowning of a `larking` man –a man that the first two lines of the poem have already told us is enduring a sort of misery in death (he moans).

The first stanza conflates (semi colon) his condition with that of the person who is obviously the subject of the title.

Lines one, three and four of the last stanza sum the cold and distant condition of the writer and amalgamates (the parenthesised second) it with the condition of the dead man.

The middle stanza has two hard, single syllable rhymes which suit it`s `reporting` purpose. While the repeated `ing` endings in the other two stanzas are suitably exact kinds of end rhymes which repeat the theme of the poem and the likeness with `still moaning` (living in death) man.

The waving and moaning both have a consonantal feel to them.

The poem pulls it`s example of `dead man` and suffering poet together By the exactly rhymed
first and last stanzas `clutching` the rhymed
middle stanza.

Two abiding questions for me are : Should line three begin with `He` instead of `I`, and if line ten is a cry, then where is the exclamation at the end?



See you Thursday.

This is a fine well worked poem

Yes, Harry, it should be 'I': 1) the poet is quoting the drowning man 2) the poet is identifying with the drowning man.

(aside: I'd rather have one poem by Stevie Smith than the complete works by that miserable rhymster Rudyard Kipling...)

The Anactoria poem
requirement of a translation is that the surface `story` of the poem should come first, and then what the poet is trying to say.

Sappho compares the opinion of others that poetical `fairness` depicted by plural, masculine, warlike scenes (Homeric? Traditional?) is obviously – in her opinion - not the `loveliest` (differently named qualities?) and that this is obvious since the `Queen of Cyprus` ( power of love?) `won` at first sight the historically celebrated Immortal Helen, described as a `palpitant to passion` young `light` and easily persuaded bride to forsake her husband, child, and beloved parents and flee to Troy. She uses this example to explain (liken?) her own similar `palpitant to passion` preference for the beautiful , but departed, Anactoria, declaring that the (individually personal)`shining pallor of her (Anactoria`s) face` is (superior?) to the again masculine, plural, and warlike poetical spectacle of Lydia`s chariots (as fairness or loveliness?)

It is said that this poem marks a departure from the traditional (Homeric?)`publicly accessible` style of ancient Greek poetry towards an introspective (and therefore more emotionally realistic?) style of poetry.

I would not damn anyone on a difficult translation, and I have no idea of the ability of Homer`s `public` Greek to include the humanly emotional, but this depiction of the immortal Helen as a sort of lovesick, forgetful young bride against a bare description of warlike `stuff`` (to demonstrate the superiority of style?) is too unbalanced to be a real poetical contest of anything.

It reminds me of the modern arguments of those who say that all poetry – no matter how introspective and individualistic – should have some sort of `universal` element in it accessible to a sympathetic enquirer.

"Tell the Truth - but tell it Slant" Emily Dickinson. Poetry isn't a universal art. It's one person speaking to another, one person at a time. I could be talking to you on the phone or sending you a text but I'm writing you a poem. Universal leads to soapboxes, poetry as moral lessons. Mostly I don't know what I'm going to say until I've said it. Universal is the values of Empire and Chuch and the Status Quo. Poetry is the Revolution of the Word, one reader/listener at a time.

I doubt whether modern poets feel the need to re-awaken rhyme as many are strongly opposed to it for a variety of reasons. It's old hat, it's boring, insincere and repetitive. It has been said of course that writing poetry without any structures such as rhyme is like playing tennis without a net! In fact many poets are not predisposed to "exercise" their grey matter to the extent that it includes any aspect of prosody ie: metre or rhyme. I wonder is it simply mental laziness on their part or a lack of literary muscle that inclines them to this attitude? Or is it a fear of being considered "out of fashion" by other poets?

None of the above. Writing good free verse is as hard as writing good rhyming verse. Writing bad rhyming verse is as easy as writing bad free verse. "No verse is free if you want to do a good job." T S Eliot. To play rock and roll all you need is two chords; to play free jazz you need to know every sound that can come out of your instrument and how to mix them them up.

Are rhyming poets just afraid of change? Do they lack literary muscle because they can't see further than the chiming of words? Or is it mental laziness that they don't ever step out of their comfort zones?

See: I can make unjustified claims about whole classes of poets too.

No offence intended but I doubt whether Steven has any benchmarks or qualifiers at all when it comes to the appreciation or analysis of poetry. Anything goes or just make it up as you go along seems to be his motto. Nevertheless he does hold views, usually in discussions like this, that he is the sole benchmark and arbitrator of what is "good and bad" in poetry; although one thing's for sure his opinions either vary from one day to the next and are often laced with an air of academic superiority. A know it all who can make unjustified claims just about anything he chooses and get away with it.

Steven and leonidas

The best way of solving these kinds of problems
is to do something like this with the poems.

.....

Dolor by Theodore Roethke

I have known the inexorable sadness of pencils,
Neat in their boxes, dolor of pad and paper weight,
All the misery of manilla folders and mucilage,
Desolation in immaculate public places,
Lonely reception room, lavatory, switchboard,
The unalterable pathos of basin and pitcher,
Ritual of multigraph, paper-clip, comma,
Endless duplicaton of lives and objects.
And I have seen dust from the walls of institutions,
Finer than flour, alive, more dangerous than silica,
Sift, almost invisible, through long afternoons of tedium,
Dropping a fine film on nails and delicate eyebrows,
Glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.


The poem:

At a cursery glance the work looks at first impressive.

In the first part the terms `inexorable sadness` `dolor``misery` `desolation` `pathos` (all terms connected with suffering or tragedy) are applied to ordinary every day objects such as `pencils` `paper weights` `folders``lavatory` and `switchboard` (all ordinary items met with in (office?) life.

In The latter part of it a fine `dust` which is `alive` and `dangerous` and settles a `film` on the (participants?) faces of this life in a `grey` and `glazing` manner. `Institutions` duplicate` and the word `tedium` depict this as a boring, a uniform and a controlling kind of process.

The first part begins with `I have known` The second with `And I have seen` Both of which are reminiscent of the proclamatory delivery style of past poets such as Ezra Pound and Yeats and moderns, such as Ginsberg and Hendri and invite us to give the work a tonal significance by reading it in their stentorian and proclamatory manner.

(IMO)
Because the reasons for the pathetic and desolate effects on the author are (even poetically) so overblown and completely out of `kilter` with the effect on him. the attempt of the author to portray what to most people is merely a boringly `bad day at the office` as a kind of portentously tragic human condition (`I have seen – I have known`) does not work.

No, Harry. I like their way of resolving them.

Offence taken, Leonidas.

Why are some people incapable of realising that just because someone has a different set of criteria for poetry than you that doesn't mean they have no 'benchmarks'? Are they so ignorant of the history of 20th Century modernism that they don't know that one can be more influenced by William Carlos Williams, Pound, Creeley, O'Hara and a whole host of other poets than the dead hand of Eng Lit critical dissection that Harry espouses.

Harry's 'critiques' in fact are nothing more than a form of mental masturbation. Has he ever changed his mind about a poem from performing his dissections? I doubt it. All it does is confirm his prejudices. Not only does it leave out a lot of modern poetry it also excludes a lot of ancient poetry. Sappho, Archilochus, Basho, all African praise song, even the Psalms fail by his criteria. Rhyming poetry has to come out on top.

Rhyme is a tool in the tool box of poetry. It's been around in English poetry only since the Rennaisance. Before that, we had stress-alliterative. Each generation adds something new to the mix: Milton added blank verse for instance (well, he probably wasn't the first: Greek & Latin poetry didn't rhyme on the whole) and later generations add their own tools. Surrealism, dadaism, add collage, juxtaposition, dream logic; free verse starts with Whitman and the Imagists bring in their own haiku like concision. Today we have versions of collage and appropriation in flarf and conceptual poetry. Then again there's slam, performance, vis-po and a whole lot of weird little by-ways you can follow if you wish.

And you don't have to like any of it. You can retreat into your own little back parlour of rhyming verse if you wish, no-one's going to stop you. And if no-one's publishing you, publish yourselves. That's what Pound did, and look what he started.

But to take your scalpel to any poetry and think that you're going to find the secret to why that poem lives for you? That's mental masturbation, and I refuse to do it all over the things that I love.

DOLOR…By Roethke

To try the work by another (more modern?) route.

If we assume that the author wishes to express the intolerable and deadening effect of the miserable and monotonous ordinariness of office life as a it grates against the free human spirit does this work manage to do it?

In my opinion...no…..why?

The call to regard his suffering with huge seriousness (`I have known…seen`) followed by the specifically extreme namings of various subjective types of suffering, and linked to ludicrously inadequate causes for such a condition, frustrates his intention from the start. It is a case of loudly rhetorical overkill against an (`evil`?) which is not poetically made apparent, and which leaves the work open to an accusation of bombast

It doesn't much work for me either. But really who cares? It works for some people. It's not maths; what's overlown for you is just right for someone else. Why do you need to insist that only your way of reading is the right way?

Because, Steven, this is a social and poetry site, and - while it is absolutely right that our own efforts should be commented on with tact and friendly good manners - the `cannon` poems of whatever era, ancient or modern, can be treated a lot more vigorously. (`con` can always be answered with `pro`)

(It`s investigation - not masturbation :))

Come on, It`s about Rhyme and meter...choose an
example and do one.

Can't see any investigation in what you're doing mate. Only dissection of the already known about. Have you ever changed your mind about a poem by doing this kind of 'investigation?' Any one else's mind? Are you expecting anyone to change their mind by acting as judge and prosecution council on these poems? You may be the wisest judge of poetry in the world for all I know but if I like what you don't like it makes no difference to me.

I have my reasons for prefering say, Basil Bunting to John Betjemen. I could explain them till I'm blue in the face, but if you don't consider virtues what I consider virtues we would still be speaking at cross purposes. Rhyme for instance is just not that important to me. Concision is. You might prefer a solid logical or consecutive arguement; I might prefer juxtaposition.
I don't even neccessarily disagree with you about Roetke. He does seem melodramatic to me; but then he was writing in the '40's and that was a bit of a fault of that age.
However, I don't see what if anything it has to do with rhyme. There's plenty of pompous rhymers out there.
And I won't be putting up a list of poems for you to dissect. I see no point in that. I'm not going to convince anyone to like what I like and, pace Leonidas, I don't think my taste is any better or worse than anyone else.

There have been some fine views expressed here, more in sync than not. I don't know how Leonidas interpreted S.W.'s views as biased.

Whenever I have tried to 'wake up' a poem for young persons, I have basically pointed out the 'poetry' skills used for the effects desired (as I understood them, of course.)There is no escaping subjective interpretation, but awareness of structure as pointers of meaning does not imply forcing another person's understanding of the poem. Yes, it influences (how could it not?) but then the reader begins to look with greater awareness to form personal ideas, and will then offer a considered agreement or a challenge.

To get back to Greggs start to this thread…O`Brien`s words pose the questions: have we gone too far in the `natural` (free verse) type of poetry? And does Rhyme (one rhetorical device) help the accumulation of effect in a poem, or encourage it`s truth conviction, or increase the moral enforcement of its words?

I think the `too far` point is indisputable. At the `serious` end (magazines, competitions, poetry blogs, etc;) free verse absolutely rules the roost. It is hard to believe that there are not at least some worthy rhymers sent in to competitions, but one gets the sense that the judges keep looking over their shoulders nervously in case compeers should catch them considering them seriously. It is definitely a `fashion` thing among them (as leonidas has said.

Rhyme is related to music and is a method of `tuning` the sounds and sense of the words to the rhythm or overall harmony of the finished work. Different combinations of the placing of the stress, tonal combinations of the vowels and consonants of the words, and the length or shortness of the stanzas or strung out form of the poem can suggest refrain, melody, Air, flourish, even campanology, to aid the poet to express a multiform meaning in his work. The ancients used quantitative verse to accomplish
the same thing.

Rhyme is much, much more the sing song.

But whatever poetry we like (form or formless) we should be prepared to go into some detail in describing it`s qualities. Otherwise we are back at the old `we like` or `we don`t like` stage which is unproductively boring.

Why should I be able to rabbit on at great length about its qualities? Am I trying to convert you to 'my' kind of poetry? And which poetic language are we using to judge it anyway? If your criteria for judging a poem are meaningless to me in what sense has your judgement any meaning for me?
You seem to need a nice set of universal rules by which all poems are judged. I don't think they exist. There are various competing and sometimes complementary criteria for judging poems but no universally agreed upon rules. Sorry if that disappoints.
In the end it does come down to I like fudge you prefer nut brittle.

Got to take seriously your chances of winning the title after today, Harry.

Steven, why confuse 'rules' with 'skills'? Surely you will allow 'universal poetical skills' regardless of what kind of 'finished' POEM you have. (I deliberately avoid 'format' because it includes 'formal' which includes 'rules'.) I don't see how we can call anything by a specific name unless it specifies some 'structure'. which by definition means 'building' which means/implies 'particular parts' afore-agreed-upon - or you have a hodgepodge of nothing universally recognizable.

Harry, I know you're trying to close this thread down, but this Academic Barrier Against Rhyme really enrages me.

Ok let's talk skills. Rhyme well-zsed is skillful. Free verse well used us skillful. Well-written haiku are skillful. But they all use different skills just as a painter in oils and a video artist use different skills but both produce something we call 'art'. Some of the skills might overlap but some will be unique to that form. I often use the space of the page in my work - and it takes skill to judge when that works and when it doesn't. It takes skill to judge the right rhyme or manipulate metre.
That's why rhyme is a tool but it's not the only one and what tool you choose to use is dependent on what kind of poetry you choose to write. A video artist needs to handle a camers befotr s/he needss to draw like a Rennaisance painter. The manipulation of the appropriate skills plus your own vision is what makes you an artist or a poet.

Much of what Steven says cannot be gainsaid. A question is (for instance) If we assume that the general theme of Eliots `the waste Land` was a civilisation `on the skids` was the deliberate decision (of a skilled rhymster) to do it in `chopped up prose` appropriate to that theme?

The poem - of course - includes more than the style of the text, but it could be a good one
to discuss in a thread like this about `natural`
versus rhyme.

(that`s if I get my computer back and don`t have to use this bloody `touchy touchy` Lap Top thing)

Much of what Steven says cannot be gainsaid. A question is (for instance) If we assume that the general theme of Eliots `the waste Land` was a civilisation `on the skids` was the deliberate decision (of a skilled rhymster) to do it in `chopped up prose` appropriate to that theme?

The poem - of course - includes more than the style of the text, but it could be a good one
to discuss in a thread like this about `natural`
versus rhyme.

(that`s if I get my computer back and don`t have to use this bloody `touchy touchy` Lap Top thing)

Anybody who thinks that T S Eliot ever wrote in 'chopped-up prose' has got tin cans for ears.

`Come on Steven, extend - give it a try:
If Eliot`s not `chopped up` - tell us why`

(tintinabulently yours) :)

(John, about the team: I`m afraid to speak in case I wake up and find I`m dreamin`)

Still not got my steam computer back yet.

He who has ears to hear let him listen Harry. If you can' even hear the musical fluidity of Eliot how on earth are you going to cope with any contemporary poetry? Try reading him aloud.

Blimey!
No-one but Steven prepared to jump in and speak up for Eliot!...What`s the poetry scene coming to?

I think `The Waste Land` was a wrong direction for poetry...what does anyone else think?

Let`s hear some of the pro stuff first

These seem endless literary debates which are being confused with many other questions except that the pro's and cons of rhyme are in serious dispute.
Questions as perennial as what constitutes poetry and conceptual writing are interesting of course. The visual arts came a cropper with the loss of critical thinking for the same reasons. It began with the idea that rhyme might return as a constraint and ended with questions such as "What is aesthetic taste?",
Here is a nugget of philosophical wisdom from Steven:
"In the end it does come down to I like fudge you prefer nut brittle."

Now could any food connoisseur be unable to distinguish between fudge and nut brittle?
Hardly, but in terms of preference? yes, it is a personal choice. But surely we are not just talking here of one poet to another making personal choices but what remains as universal in poetry. And yes it is pointless to dissect the rose in order to appreciate it’s intrinsic beauty-this is fundamental in the appreciation of art.

Leonidas,
We understand the point about dissecting to `murder`. But I would suggest that the problem today is the opposite one of a mere `I like` or `I don`t like` without anyone giving reasons for either.

Rhyme or free is an excellent candidate for an
attempt at explanation (almost any explanation)
of why we like any particular poem done in either form.

We don`t mean a critical genius-like treatment of the differences, just a going into the actual poems and giving some sensible points about why we like them or don`t like them.

And why not poems from the various `canons` ?
The authors are usually dead, so who`s to take offence?

And it`s not just textual form, what about language, or theme, or intent?

We do it with other kinds of literature - why not with poetry?

I'm sure the dinosaurs thought that mammals were a wrong direction in evolution.

The idea that poetry has a right or a wrong direction is as ridiculous as an extremely ridiculous thing.

Or as Charles Olson put it:

"What does not change / is the will to change"

Wow this is a long and interesting thread.
I have a few caveats: Although Chris Co gave loads of interesting and lovely poems as examples, I would quarrel with him over the idea that 'Anthem for Doomed Youth' was in any way unrhymed. It is a sonnet with a consistent rhyme scheme:
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, –
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
abab, cdcd, effe,gg.
It is one of my favourite poems.
I find rhyme a useful tool, but it depends what I am trying to convey. Sometimes it is not the tool I want to use.
I find the idea that 'modern' poetry being unrhymed is therefore 'natural' to be laughable.
Some poets, with a lot of academic status, write stuff I cannot differentiate from prose, because it seems to have no form at all, and might as well be a letter or an email.
Andrew Motion says that 'he aims to write in clear language without tricks' and his language is quite natural sounding, but sometimes it does not feel like poetry to me. Other times, he creates patterns by repetition, of words, or of form, which give a shape to his work.
But a lot of modern work is using structures which are far from natural.

Sometimes I make poems in my head, with nothing to write on. Rhyme helps me to keep a handle on them. I think it is a good memory aid, but maybe unrhymed poetry is not written to be memorised. Writing while walking seems to call up rhythms that fit with the walking action. Rhythm is part of our physical activity so it holds it own meanings. It also helps one remember lines.

I find out things I didn't know when I analyse the language of a poem, so I don't agree with the idea that poems are tied down and tortured by analysis. You can discover a great deal you don't know. We take the structure of language for granted, but a good poem is using all kinds of layers of meaning. How the effect of the poem is achieved can be discovered through analysis.

IMO, we must stop using the word 'modern'. I believe we really mean 'contemporary.'

I am strict with myself about definitions because I find so often that people think they are discussing the same subject when, actually, they are not. It is very irritating to my family and friends. I am not including digression here, for going 'off-topic' means you do recognize 'on-topic'.

A good input, Freda, as always.

You are right as usual Cynthia. I think 'Modern' applies to the styles of poetry introduced by Ezra Pound and T S Eliot, and started with Imagism, a style based initially on the work of the woman poet 'HD' who had absorbed some of the ideas of Japanese Haiku, if I am right, and tried to keep to a very succinct way of referring to direct sensation and visual image, employing these to bring together two or more concepts which we might see as having something in common which could not be expressed simply in words.
Ezra Pound expressed his views about how poetry should be written, and both he and Eliot felt it should be something you work to understand, having a richness of allusion that could not be understood simply.
Quite the opposite, I suppose, of Wordsworth, who loved simplicity and reference to ordinary life.
Partly it was in reaction to the poetry at the turn of the century which was often over elaborate and sentimental, appealing to popular feelings.
As this modern movement took place a hundred years ago, before the first world war, it is certainly not a contemporary movement, if we take contemporary literally to mean in our own day.
(Contemporary in terms of style is fixed in the 1950's)
Every generation tries to describe some style or other as belonging to their own time, but the words they use age and their meaning changes.
I wonder what is really the poetry of the present day? I think we have to say 'the poetries' of the present day.
Certainly rhyme and rhythm are found everywhere, except perhaps in the small presses which try to avoid printing it. In Open Mic nights there is plenty.
Metaphor is everywhere too, and there is a lot of use of complicated structures like the sestina and others.
Found poetry gets a big following, as Winston Plowes shows.
But poems with neither rhyme nor rhythm are also ubiquitous. If you look at anthologies, there is a lot of use of natural speech units, so that stanzas may be broken into lines, but they are also paragraphs. Then again, some poets count syllables, and some delight in caesura, sometimes with the effect of allowing a word to belong here, or there, depending how you read it.
Its all clever stuff, but to me a poem has to mean something, and reach you in different ways.
So to come back to the subject, what exactly is the 'importance' of rhyme? Does it need to be asserted?
I do not believe that a poem without rhyme is a bad poem. I think it is a tool in the poets toolbox. But I think what needs asserting is that if you use rhyme, use it well, or you set people's teeth on edge. Don't think it is easy to use well.
In my humble opinion.

I wasn't going to add anything, but will for the sake of clarity.

Rhyme and rhyme scheme are Very different things. At the start of our discussion Harry and the subject in hand very much seemed to be centred upon the the former, rather than the latter.

Harry later looked to include consonance as rhyme about half way through the discussion, having not mentioned it prior, though oddly he saw half rhyme otherwise known as slant rhyme as modern and not part of rhyme and assonance went unmentioned.

I have to say, I feel the goalposts of the discussion have moved on a number of occasions.

Separate from which I would argue that certain rhyme scheme are as distant from rhyme as one can get, Larkin's at grass being an example. Any notion of rhyme or sound of rhyme - it is missing to the extent that almost all that read the poem do so in a free verse style. Yes you can argue on the page that it still carries a notion of rhyme via the eye, but I have to say that is very tenuous, as evidenced by the readings I have mentioned.

As for Anthem For Doomed Youth - you're quite right Freda. I was going through poems at a pace and reeling off quite a number. I would hope that the general gist of my point would clearly outweigh the odd error. Again, even here I would question what the original issue was, rhyme, or rhyme scheme - as I say they are quite different things.

If we wish our poetry to chime, then rhyme scheme, doesn't always do what simple rhyme does. So the question is what is the discussion actually about? Haha

If rhyme scheme is included, why not half rhyme? If consonance is included then why not assonance? If assonance is included, doesn't that beg the question as to whether we are talking about rhyme anymore at all? Surely then the discussion is one of the use of poetic devices, rather than simply rhyme.

P.S

I cannot even begin to explain how much I am in accordance with Steven here. I would go further. I think Harry is categorically and factually wrong.

How?

Well if Harry is right, then all poems can be objectively evaluated. To ascertain there value as by way of measurement. That is exactly what Harry has been claiming can be done and what he has said he has been doing.

Ok then, if the evaluation is objective, rather than subjective, then it must be possible to provide us all with the objective criteria in order that these evaluations can be undertaken by anyone.

On which note. I would ask Harry, or anyone else who claims to be able to objective evaluate poems...

Can you please provide your criteria?

I don't mind if it is yes or no binary, or if is in another form. We can take any method or criteria and either create an algorithm or run differing poems through this claimed objective process.

In so doing we can definitely state which poems are good, which are bad and we can designate a number to each and every poem in order of quality. In effect if such an objective criteria exists, we can state what is better a Shakespearean sonnet or something free verse by T.S Eliot. We can objectively qualify quality, state the best 10 poems of all time in numerical order.

If such an objective test exists, presumably we can also by extension apply the same logic to paintings and music etc

And at number 1 Mozart, definitely better, provably better than Brahms, and at number 1 we have the Mona Lisa, definitely better than anything ever painted by Turner or Dali etc.

Of course, I know for an absolute FACT that nobody here will be able to produce an objective test and criteria. You can't do it Harry, nobody here can.

What you claim is an objective evaluation of poetry changes each time and it is subjective, NOT objective.

If I am wrong though, like I say, please provide the criteria/data and we shall see!

Just to be clear. My point is NOT to say that poetic analysis is pointless, serves no purpose or that it cannot be done - of course it can and there are many ways to go about the job. You may analyse poetic structure, meaning, sound, almost any singular aspect you like. And yes you can form a thesis bringing together such parts and yes you may say why you think the poem works or fails.

What you cannot do is objectively analyse the poem and come up with a definitive, accountable value.

I must say I think I have witnessed the ultimate absurdity in this thread. I highlighted the poems Dolor and Not waving but drowning, they are two favourites. Both are famous poems, that have stood the test of time, both are admired the world over.

I then see Harry attempting to tell me why I am wrong and how in fact both poems do not work. This is absurd. This is not an objective evaluation, it is a subjective one. Nothing wrong with that, and nothing wrong with not liking either or both poems.

But really, to claim they do not work?

This would seem to fly in the face of a judgement made by the world over time. And what do we have to know the world is wrong? As I say, please provide this criteria, so that we may experimentally run all poems through its all seeing eye :)

P.S

I hope people realise too that, if they think such a criteria exists, or can be created. We would then expect to be able to reverse engineer the process.

If we have this golden criteria, we may write the greatest poetry the world has yet seen or heard!!!

So pray tell, what's the criteria?

Please excuse typos...time is at a premium and so I was either going to detail what I have as is, or leave it altogether. No doubt some of you would have preferred the latter lol

Much merit in what you're written Freda, I would also concur with the use of contemporary and Cynthia. Modern - has been stretched a little too far.

Frieda - I actually agree that analysis can help the reading of a poem. But not when it's just about which poem is best. That just turns it into a pissing contest and us frankly boring.

As for the 'ubiquity' of free verse, there is of course a lot of dull verse around. Always was always will be. Before free verse there was dull mechanical metre ("compose according to the rhythms if music not the metronome" Pound).

Modernisms opened up a whole new world of sound and vision and feeling in the early 20th century that are unfamiliar to many even now. I once saw a brilliant performance of Schwitter's Ursinate in a basement in Bury: not a single recognisable word in it. It was first performed in the 1930's and has become an avant garde classic. Is it noise, poetry, music? I don't care, I loved it.

But that kind of stuff probably isn't everyone's cup of tea. I could analyse it till the cows come home and you might still hate it. Like the people who rioted at the first performance of the Rite of Spring, there's no accounting for taste.

And there's no real accounting for those of us who love experimental writing either. We're not better than people who love Kipling or Hughes or Larkin. Though we can be snooty about it of course. That's human nature. Modern jazz v trad, prog v pop, classical v folk etc.

Instead of all these endless rounds of who's better than who wouldn't it be better to just accept that we all have different tastes?

Well said Steven.

Here we go again-SW now says that analysis is ok with caveats. Firstly, in terms of mere merit, all written or spoken poetry requires a reader or listener, without which it is impossible to comprehend, understand or define absolutely how poetry works. Poetry requires or even necessitates an audience, to be heard or known to exist. Poet and audience are interdependent factors. Although many poets have a natural contempt for any type of audience-fearing it might disturb their personal journey. Silent, unread or unwritten poetry will ultimately remain an enigma to the world-a type of Pandora’s box awaiting release or an embryo awaiting fertilisation in the mind of the reader. There are as yet many poets who have not been, and do not wish to be exposed to a living audience. There are indeed poems that have never seen the light of day. As absurd as this may appear, I believe the poet’s silence, or for that matter his presence is just as powerful and articulate as his written or spoken work.

“....Speech is a river of breath bent into hisses and hums by the soft flesh of the mouth and throat...”

W. H. Auden’s definition of poetry as “memorable speech” was redefined by Donald Davie as “considered speech”. Others might add “elevated or configurated speech”. In my view none of these definitions suffice to define or capture some of the rare or the indefinable aspects of living poetry-those which are visceral or audible and those which are invisible or metaphysical. Poetry exists everywhere, it has always existed and continues to exist even when we are not immediately conscious of it. The poetic mind merely “taps” into it. However, the work or business of a poet is a compulsion as much as it is a conscious action although some believe it relies merely on talent, learning or technique. Artists may be instinctive, intuitive or highly conscious in response to their environment and consequently their flow of “work”. However, what a poet does (whenever he has the occasion or motivation) is to convey this personal presence, this sublime silence, this depth of comprehension and perception via a semantic and phonetic medium; and we call this phenomenon poetry. Poetry can be accidentally, unconsciously or consciously created. But poetry cannot exist without a poet and neither can it exist as a reality without an audience. Poetry, at least in this sense, is a conveyance, or vehicle for a particular form of mental and emotional perambulance in the being or mind of the poet. Its’ impact or meaning can be altered by the mind of the listener or reader. In fact poets often play with ambiguity or introduce it into their work for reasons best known to themselves. If a poet is vague or cryptic they challenge the audience to obtain meaning or solve their “word puzzle”. Therefore, the words or thoughts of the reader or listener are never akin to, nor automatically resonate identically with those of the poet or author. The thoughts or words of the poet’s readership or audience are merely a distorted echo or flickering shadow of the original creation intended by the poet. The poet is the drum-stick and the audience are the drum-skin that reverberates to that “impact”. Moreover there is often a psychological gulf between an audience and the poet and that might extend into several semantic or linguistic chasms as they proceed. We might call this space mysterious, unknown but awaiting discovery by the readership or audience. In reality we have to “know” people before we can readily “listen” to them, just as we need to feel secure in places before we can relax in them. Some poets may possess a natural or instinctive intelligence, an acquired mental capacity and an emotional field of experience accessible to only a few and in some cases none. Are we capable of really listening? A reader or listener, of which there are many, does not necessarily possess the same degree of aesthetic sensibility or level of perception as does the poet themselves. Unless of course the reader is also a poet. Unfortunately, there are no parthenogenic poets out there who are insulated or self-created; their poetry resembles what they have read in the past and understood in their past as being “poetry”. The reader, of necessity, must be acquainted with a broader spectrum of poetic utterances if they are to approach readily the work of a new poet completely unknown to them. The gullibility of the audience is a danger to literature. When the poet has become known to them, they can just as easily be rejected; that is as soon as the source of their style is detected, their readers condemn and abandon them. But we must bear in mind that the majority of poets are also subject to unconscious parody, pastiche, or vague imitation of other poets, usually from their past. It may be their syntax, their rhythm, their vocabulary or tone which have left a residue in the memory of many contemporary poets that is being borrowed or cloned in their own work.

In poetry, as it is in all other literary forms, modernity means simply that times have changed and with it our mode of language or communication, which in turn affects the nature of our aesthetic sensibilities. Yes, sensibilities change, otherwise we’d still be wearing bones in our noses. It is the same with popular fashions within any generation but with artistic language it is a rather long, drawn out organic metamorphosis or the molecular exchange of distillation that takes place; similar to the manner in which disparate groups or individuals struggle to communicate with each other for meaning and empathy. It takes a long time and a lot of effort for them to reach a state of mutual agreement.

But fashions or customs are often resurrected. The liturgical, ritualistic and ceremonial quality of 15th and 16th century verse has, over a long period of time, gradually given way to an underlying if not in some instances overt “play” with words within a more secular society. That is not to say that faith or spiritual ideas do not play a part in modern poetry. Whereas previously the poet revered a God or “gods”, made votive offerings, recited prayers and sung hymns to a supernatural entity. Now, these forms have been substituted by modern odes to energy, nature, supraconscious awareness, technological change, or the ineffable presence of an invisible power pervading the universe. So, what is modern poetry, supposedly free of the conventions of the past? Is it merely a geological strata of literary work which has been deposited over a much older poetic strata-wholly discernible yet wrought or derived from the same inimitable source? Some critics would say that for poetry to be considered “modern” it must owe nothing in structure, style or character to that of the past. A tall order I would have thought, which leaves modern poetry, at least in definition, as owing everything to the present or the future?

But we know that not all modern poets have wholly or categorically abandoned archaic poetic forms or structures for very special reasons. In fact they have often renovated or transformed them into something modern and innovative. As a poet develops they may need a supporting structure, one might say “scaffold” in order to lock their conscious mind on a particular subject or aim. Heroic couplets, 14-line sonnet forms, terza rimas and such like perform this task quite adequately. They prevent the poet’s mind from wandering too far from the process of concentration. These arcane forms are “mental mandalas” or secure enclosures within which a particular form of contemplation and deep-level meditations occur. Like the hero of the Odyssey, Dionysus was tied to the mast of his ship so that he would not be distracted by temptations, many poets are happy to undertake a voyage that embraces restriction or one might say “resistance of material” in order to function at a particular level. It helps to focus and concentrate their mind. Conversely, at other times some poets need the freedom and space to develop their originality and adopt new bearings.

I read through everything you said Leonidas and I have to say; an awful lot of convoluted/strange/odd language selection, from which there appears to be very little of any discernible worth. At least as far as I can see.

If that seems harsh, I'm sorry. I'm just not sure how any of the above relates to the subject at hand? You appear to be attempting (very badly) to define poetry.
Perhaps I am missing something; but i'm not sure what the purpose is?

If you think you can divine good poetry from bad via a criteria (something that has been discussed), I would simply ask you to provide that criteria.

Not sure you do wish to do that to be fair to you. If you do not wish to set out a criteria (Something I have claimed is impossible), then I guess we are having separate conversations. If that is the case, I shall leave you to it.

P.S

Odysseus is the hero of the Odyssey, not Dionysus. Unless I read a differing novel during classical studies.

How far back shall we go?

Ezra Pound, T S Eliot, Bunting and a lot of the early Modernists went back a lot further than the Renaisance for poetic models. They went back to the stress/alliterative verse of Anglo-Saxon and Scandanavian epics.

Greek heroic couplets were written in iambic unrhymed hexameters. The Psalms and Biblical forms were behind Whitman, and later Ginsberg and others.

Japanese and Chinese verse forms were the inspiration of much Imagism. Aboriginal forms have influenced others.

Just because someone isn't particularly interested in the Post-Rennaisance Parnassian forms imported from Italy doesn't mean they are not drawing on tradition. They are just drawing on different traditions, as well as imparting their own spin on things, making it new as it were.

Beyond a certain level of competence, trying to rank poetry as 'better,' or 'best', is essentially about personal taste and personal criteria. There are no universal criteria; and if there were, who would be the judge anyway?

Gerard Manley Hopkins also took his inspiration from alliterative anglo-saxon verse - hence his sprung rhythm poetry. Just to add to your list Steven.

I agree with the caveat, "beyond a certain level of competence", I think that was something important to add; that had previously not been mentioned.

Not only is/are there no universal criteria upon which anybody can rate poetry - there never will be!

If it were ever possible to do so...logically the person who had this magical criteria/formula should be able to reverse engeneer the process. And simply produce the greatest poetry of all time.

Presumably they could then go on to produce an objective criteria and definitive list "of the best" in all the arts lol

Oh hang on...but they can't can they? :)

And some came down to the river to drink
and were devoured whilst doing so.

Some others came down to the river to drink and kept watch whilst others drank, thus taking their turn safely

He knew when the when the safest time to drink was and came alone unheralded.

Now that everyone agrees that analysis can actually help a poem can someone else go ahead and actually analyse one of the bloody things at last.

(forget all the `best` `better` `perfect` stuff
just go through it)

Pick an oldie.

No Harry. I'm not going to be caught out like that again. Leave it alone and go get a life.

Now that we have some agreement that analysis doesn't help tell us which poems are best, or better beyond a certain level.

Doesn't that bring this discussion to a close?

I can understand Steven's reluctance here, I share it lol. Potentially at the least Harry it does look like it could lead to a circular argument and put us back where we were prior. Surely if we now wish to analyse a poem or poems - it is now for entirely differing reasons that do not fit in with the remit of this thread?

I am not averse to poetic analysis, but should it not be in a new thread? And before getting in to anything like that, should we not first be asking a new question, such as what are we looking to achieve or understand? The danger of course is going around in circles, hence Steven's separate thread/point - which I think has a lot of merit.

I think objective analysis is most appropriate when dealing in objective certainties. Such as meter, form, use of poetic devices, questions of that nature. Beyond that I would say analysis from the subjective or personal viewpoint is probably more appropriate. Steven makes a point in his other thread, if I understand him correctly. He seems to suggest or raise the idea of people, each person analysing their own favourite poem or poems. I think this would be much more positive, enlightening and in the spirit or raison d'etre of the site.

If a couple of people analysed a favourite poem they had, via a blog say. If they did that offering a little objective and subjective analysis whilst turning comments off; we could agree or disagree in our own minds. We could all garner something from the page, without it becoming a battle of rights and wrongs.

A thought at any rate...

Wow that's short for me - what's gone wrong lol

P.S

This was always going to be my last discussion on the site. It has been very interesting, but in all honesty I don't think my overly analytical and wordy nature is best suited to such online discussions. I prefer poetry and meeting people in the flesh and enjoying the events - all of which seem to like me better as well.

I bid you adieu.

Sorry guys but I am simply voicing my opinion like everyone else in a democratic world and that is what a discussion forum is for. I am not able to say what is best or better only what I think! The fact is though this forum is probably the most pathetic I've encountered on the internet for discussion, either because invariably people go off on an unintelligible tangent (as I have proved;-) or they are incapable of discussing the questions without recourse to insult! This discussion has been a typical example of how not to hold a discussion and should be consigned to the trash can! I could of course think of a hundred possibilities for discussion on the theme of poetry but fear that in the end it will prove fruitless or futile as the old arguments and adolescent "misunderstandings" continue to re-emerge ad nauseum.

All too often (in life) a discussion becomes an argument and if the flames are fanned with (too much) oxygen the original content of the discussion can be lost. Rudeness and overbearing viewpoints aside, there is much to mourn in the apparent loss of the ability to discuss without prejudice.

On the matter of the topic therefore:
For the majority of people, the rhyme is probably the most clearly identifiable element in a piece of poetry. In poetry rhyme is a form of what is technically known as “Iteratio” or a series of repeated elements of which there is:

1. Phonetic Repetition (rhyme or alliteration).
2. Syllabic pattern repeats () stressed and unstressed.
3. Repetition of certain lines, phrases or words.
4. Repetition of the stanza structure (ABBA ACBC).
5. Repetition of consonants or vowels.

However, strictly speaking rhyme and verse, though often employed simultaneously are in themselves two totally independent elements in poetry. There are differing forms of rhyme, just as there are differing forms of verse. Rhymes generally occur in the last words of a sentence and fall into two distinct categories, - visual and aural. In the former, the words are visually similar eg; "bough" and "enough", while in the latter it is necessary for the rhyme to conform to the particular sound quality of the word as in "tough" and "rough". In true rhyme the last stressed vowels and the letters following them constitute the aural pattern for example as in: rage, and age, or pleasure and treasure.
Jack Spratt could eat no fat
His wife could eat no lean
But between them both
At suppertime,
They licked the platter clean.
The above is a simple example of what the majority of people naturally identify as rhyme. However, there are many variations in rhyme, the most common is to have the final word or syllable rhyme with that of the previous line. Strictly speaking true rhyme necessitates that it is the stressed syllable in each line (usually at the end of the line) which rhymes although many poets tend to ignore this rule without realising their error.

However the rhyme could occur at any point in any group of lines within a stanza or verse and this can often become a patterned repeat which occurs throughout the entire poem. Using similar vowel sounds can also make rhymes easier as in “Too, few & true” or as in “Joe would row and blow”. A rhyme may be wholly or strictly adhered to or simply manipulated to suit the needs of the poet or the structure and style of the poem. A nonsense rhyme may manipulate words just for the sake of making the rhyme itself. A partial rhyme effect is often created by the use of alliteration (see below) when certain vowels or consonants are repeated in a line or verse. A double rhyme is created by words such as "pre-sence" and "ess-ence", while a triple or what is known as a "tumbling rhyme" is created by words such as de-pra-vi-ty, gra-vi-ty and ca-vi-ty. The latter examples were much favoured by Gilbert and Sullivan in their operas.
A double rhyme may actually necessitate the use of two words instead of one as in the case of “childhood” with “wild wood”. Masculine and feminine endings are found in rhyme. When the syllable just before the last is stressed this is defined as a feminine ending thereby conferring a gentle falling inflexion. William Shakespeare was fond of using this in many of his later plays. The masculine ending being the exact reverse when the last syllable is stressed or emphasised thereby creating a gentle rise in the sound of the line. Coleridge wrote the whole of the Ancient Mariner so the lines and verses contained feminine endings throughout and this gives the work its’ rather soft, mysterious and ethereal quality.
It should be understood that in English some words may have more than one meaning or have totally different meanings although they are spelt exactly the same, for example “a well”, from which water is drawn and the use of “well” as an adverb, ie; “performing well”. Other words in English sound similar but are spelt differently for example; “a stile” (a type of gate) and a “style” as in the case of fashionable items or literary genre. Some words only have a specific meaning when assimilated within a frame of reference and this frame can be distorted or even veiled through artful or cunning conceit. Although apparently confusing when initially encountered in this way, whenever rationally explored they can be used to good effect in aural poetry where an ambiguity of meaning can be created and then resolved. Although Onomatopœia has different applications it is still a branch of rhyme.

This technique is the formation and use of names or words from sounds resembling those generally associated with the function, object or action referred to or described. In this sense it is a kind of literary mimicry. Consonants and vowels are so carefully juxtaposed from one word to another ie: "soft, shoe shuffle" as to actually mimic or suggest the sound made at such an event. Another typical example is the sound made by the Cuckoo, the oft repeated Ku-koo! So a bird’s specific call, in contrast to say in general terms the word tweet or trill, has contributed to the actual naming of the bird. Therefore words such as clatter, rattle, cackle or prattle, imitate the actual sound or condition being described not specifically the object. Another useful example is the close affinity between a certain word such as "rustle", the actual sound of reeds or rushes moving in the wind and a man's name, in this instance, Russell. Since a great deal of poetry deals with phonetic repetition and mimicry for effect, onomatopoeia is greatly favoured by poets whose ears are attuned to many natural, supernatural and mechanical sounds. Many arcane and popular or colloquial terms are used to define different forms of rhyme which can be confusing to the layman.

To sum up therefore there is:

• Alternate Rhyme -where the rhyme scheme usually alternates eg: AB, AB, AB etc.
• Perpetual Rhyme -where the whole of the verse, stanza or poem has the same phonetic rhyme (A, A, A, A, etc).
• Double Rhyme & Triple Rhyme employed for words as well as the lines in each verse (eg: AA, BB, AA, BB or AAA, BBB, CCC, DDD etc)
• Non-Rhyme (ie: Verse Libre)
• Partial Rhyme which is usually found in popular songs where perhaps only the vowels form a rhyme often because of the way they are pronounced by the singer. Known technically as the use of assonance and consonance.
• Virtual Rhyme-where words appear to rhyme.
• Visual Rhyme-where words have similar spelling but different meanings or similar sounds but different spellings.
• Incantatory or Phonetic Rhyme (Syllabic & Alliterative).

On the matter of wether Dionysus was ever tied to a mast:
http://greece.mrdonn.org/greekgods/dionysus.html
Hasta la vista folks.....

Wonderful stuff Leonidas

One thing wrong about that list:" Unrhymed ie verse libre" - you'd be right if you said eg. You missed out 'blank verse' - unrhymed but metrical verse. Eg Paradise Lost, the Prelude and the dramatic verse of Shakespeare. And then thete's Sprumg Rhythm a la Hopkins....

Leonidas,

As someone who never looks at these technical
accounts of how rhyming works until something
in a poem jars my ears, thanks for an excellent example. It should be made more accessible for general usage.

I often wonder what sonar `wavelength` our brains tune into when they read (as opposed to listening to) rhymed poetry.

Well it was an attempt, and you may note by an amateur to list these functions or elements-my apologies if it did not cover every base :(.

However, Harry's comment is of great significance since scientists working on this phenomenon have discovered distinct brainwaves when reading and listening to poetry....In fact every sound we make has a musical resonance that can be identified by today's computer technology!!!!!
See below:
https://www.monroeinstitute.org/research/cat/music1/the-human-knowledge-system-music-and-brain-coherence

Thinking of Sean O`Brien`s remark about
going too far in the direction of being too
`natural` in poetry at the beginning of this
thread caused me to read through the prize
winners of the Poetry society`s National
poetry competition during the last thirty five
years in order to find out how may rhyming
poets had succeeded.

Of the thirty six winners (one year joint)
rhymesters won in years 1982 and 1986, and
there was a flush of three rhymester winners
in `91 `92 and `93. Since that year twenty
more years have passed and there has only
been one winner (`04) with a little rhyme
in it. (only six out of thirty six).

Out of the hundred and forty one second and
third poems and those commended since the
year 2001 only seven of the poems recorded
have been have been rhymed poems. (seven
out of a hundred and forty one)

Bearing in mind the prevalence of rhyme in
so much British taught poetic history, plus
its continuance at so many poetry readings,
one wonders whether the creators of rhymed
poetry at the higher levels suspect an inbuilt
prejudice against (or snobbish reluctance to
consider) rhymed work by the judges of so
many poetry competitions. A perusal of the
winners of – not only this -but nearly all of
the other National poetry competitions would
lead to this conclusion.

It is impossible to believe that rhymed work,
not only equal, but sometimes superior to the
`natural` stuff is not being produced in Britain today, but is not being entered in competitions because of this prejudice.

Am I right?

I have just spent the best part (also meaning
"worthwhile") of an hour following the posts
on this discussion link, some of them of
extraordinary length and depth.
I tend to view the lack of rhyme in poetry
alongside the absence of melodic gift in much
contemporary music - mainly in the classical
genre. "Meandering" seems apposite when
considering the latter. No core! And no core = no heart
As for the description of Kipling as a "miserable rhymster"(sic): the discipline
of language, range of material and ability
to communicate indicates his awareness of the
passing of an age that saw his own son die
in war.
"The tumult and the shouting dies;
The Captains and the Kings depart:
Still stands Thine ancient sacrifice,
An humble and a contrite heart.
Lord God of Hosts, be with us yet,
Lest we forget - lest we forget!"
The fact is that rhyme will make something
memorable doubly so. This is - and will
continue to be - its strength when well
written. Poorly written, it becomes
doggerel.

M.C.
Glad you woke this up.


This thread is about asserting the importance of Rhyme. The question is: From serious poetry (as acknowledged by competition winners) why has it virtually vanished?

It`s not credible that there have not been - at least some - worthy rhymers submitted. So what is happening?

Harry - I wonder if the "need" to be part of
something "new" has seen the disregard, disrespect even, that now banishes rhyme.
Add to that thought, the proposal that
rhyme requires disciplined yet imaginative
use of a wide vocabulary in context, and
that tends to show that it is being
sidetracked for a number of questionable
reasons.
Are contemporary poets now being persuaded
that it is not "the way" nowadays? Is this
coincidence when much contemporary music in
a more serious vein also has no discernible
tune but many notes; as if the mechanical
exercise itself was THE important part,
rather than the meaning and worth of the finished product.
Rhyme in poem or song has been known to make people weep as well as laugh aloud, and that
surely says it's time to assert its
importance.
Cheers.

If you really want to know what rhyme has become I suggest you take a look at the dreadfully imitable Kate Tempest...

SW - not familiar with that of which you speak.
Will search accordingly. As for "dreadful" -
subjective/objective or just pejorative?
I note your posts here - many and extensive -
and accept your stance on the many variations
of poetry available to the interested mind.
However, the essence of this discussion is based on a simple question in the context of
what is published nowadays, and is nothing if
not timely.
Cheers.

She's very in and hip... Rhymes a lot... Always has a message (usually terribly Positive...) and she was chosen as a Next Generation poet.)

I don't really mind rhyme - except when it's the only game in town. Poetry is about the play of language against/with sense and rhyme is part of the toolbox not the whole toolbox. The most musical poet in English in the twentieth century was Basil Bunting to my ear, who took his sound from the Anglo Saxon wordhoard as well as anything else. Milton thought rhyme was just vulgar tinkling. I don't agree as such; but if it's all you have, you have prose that rhymes.

was a time Steven, if I remember rightly, that rhymes brought you out in Hives.
Gus

Regarding free verse versus rhyme.

When we talk about various types of rhyme or rhythm or blank or free verse we are talking about the various FORMS of poetry. (the shells of the things) The job of the form is to help the poem express it`s meaning.

Line breaks are fairly easily identified in most rhymed or rhythmed poetry, and we are told that they are absolutely of the essence in evaluating free verse.

I recently listened to an entertaining and charming recording on line-break by poet Mimi Khalavati which told me nothing whatsoever about it. I therefore done some `swotting` on it...and -as far as I can make out – all the explanations ( breath, capitalisation, order and choice of words etc) are essentially
prosaic.

Is free verse poetry–or only chopped up prose?
Can anyone give me some examples to convince me one way or the other?

Not to forget that strange hybrid creature said to lurk on the fringes of 'proper' poetry, the Prose Poem...

Oh and Gus, sometimes you get honey out of hives ;-)

"Poetry is about the play of language against/with sense and rhyme is part of the toolbox not the whole toolbox . . . but if it's all you have, you have prose that rhymes."

Steven, I couldn't agree more. (well I suppose I could, but it would involve kissing your butt . . . )

What a lovely discussion thread. It hasn't descended into out and out war and it's brought a big smile to my face.

I totally agree with Steven's analysis - or at least I think I do. Rhyme's great - I use it a lot - but it's not the whole toolbox and it needs to be used appropriately - and that would be a very subjective 'appropriately'. For me it's all about 'flow' - expressing yourself in a beautiful way with or without rhyme - unless you are looking for a deliberate discordant sound to make some point.

Isobel`s timely contribution has made me
reflect that my `chopped up prose` remark
is a bit combative.

Could I just be clear that I think that there
are probably many examples of prose in
literature which verge towards the poetic.
And now, of course poetry which actually
calls itself `prose poetry`. The problem is
that: If we wish to continue to distinguish
between the two terms `prose` and `poetry`
then we need to identify the difference.

Historically the difference between them was
based on the sonar or typographical position of rhythm and / or rhyme in the spoken or written work. This difference obtains no longer. It`s not an exaggeration to say that rhyme (and to a large extent rhythm.) as it was formally used has almost disappeared from (serious) modern poetry completely. Academia is correct about the worth of the British poetic tradition and this is a great loss.

I am personally glad that the `looseness` of what we call poetry has encouraged more people to `do it` but I really think that we should be urging them to strive to get some more of the `musical bones` of rhythm and rhyme into their efforts.

And–by the way–CAN anyone help me about the
positioning of the line-break in free verse?

Have you actually read or, better still listened, to any of Kate Tempest's work Steve?
She is young and trending and doing something quite distinctive, particularly with her recorded work - which is Mercury Prize nominated no less.
You're not meant to get it ;-) but the kids do - and if that brings new writers into the poetry scene and that gets them adapting the form into recorded output - then she will have proved to be invaluable in moving the genre forward - not just harping on about the past and the oh so technical and the bastard rhymers of words ;-)
Christ, sometimes the navel gazing becomes so tedious - if it works, whether you like it - or agree with that - or not - then let it work and let others enjoy it even if you don't.
rhyme is as important in poetry as any other 'tool' and using rhyme doesn't make a really good piece of poetry any more or less intellectual or enjoyable. At the end of the day, someone who appreciates all poetry is going to have a more pleasurable experience than someone who narrows their view. just my opinion of course ;-)

One comment and out lol

Harry your version of history is one that never existed!

Meter NOT rhyme was the keystone of English verse Harry. At least this is the case from middle-English onward.

Ever heard of blank verse?

http://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blank_verse

Blank verse = NO rhyme!

One look at old English reveals alliterative anglo saxon verse. Hundreds of years where alliteration was the key, NOT rhyme!

So your old world of only rhyme. Sorry Harry, but it didn't exist!

If you want to have an obsession with rhyme that's fine and yes it has played a significant part in the history of English verse, but so has un-rhymed poetry. No point in bashing people over the head with your favourite tool hehe. Not forever at least :)

And yes I tool like rhyme in the appropriate context as everyone else has indicated.

How long has free verse been with us? It is far from some avant garde new age marvel. If you want to understand line breaks, I would suggest reading on the subject. After all there are hundreds of papers to be found on the matter and there is always that most useful of poetic instruments - intuition :)

One last thing. The idea that without rhyme is to be without rhythm, with or without meter is to be living in the dark ages.

All you need do is read aloud any great free verse poet and you'll hear rhythm and musicality where intended. Simon Armitage, Paul Farley, Andrew Motion etc. for avant-garde poets and their musicality speak to Steven. I am sure he can offer a few helpful pointers in that regard.

Here is Paul Farley and treacle;

http://www.theguardian.com/books/video/2011/dec/16/paul-farley-poem-treacle-video

P.S

Not seen you in ages, would be nice to, to say hello and hear you read to. Maybe we could sort out a night at Chester poets. Love to you and Yvonne - forgive the words of joust!

Yes Ian I have both heard and read Ms Tempempest. If no images to speak of and a half-arsed hip hop rythm with no real music and a total lack of any ideas deeper than a Beyonce lyric are what young people are looking for, they can keep her. Fortunately their are plenty of young poets out there who are doing great things wuth language.

One comment on free verse: from a morr experimental position. Sometimes there are rules for that poem or sequence rather like in free improv you can have players improvising around a restrictef number of notes or a mode. Or there's a visual element. Sometimes it's as vague as what feels right, or what surprises the reader. No verse is totally free.

This has to be one of the most comprehensive and entertaining "discourses" on its subject ever to have found its way into the poetry forum.
No one following it could come away without feeling better informed.
Well done, all concerned.

Chris
Good to hear from you (where would we be without the `jousting?)

I was careful to talk of rhythm (which is meter)as well as rhyme. Part of one of your own favorite poems:
.....
And that simplest Lute,
Placed length-ways in the clasping casement, hark!
How by the desultory breeze caressed,
Like some coy maid half yielding to her lover,
It pours such sweet upbraiding, as must needs
Tempt to repeat the wrong! And now, its strings
Boldlier swept, the long sequacious notes
Over delicious surges sink and rise,
Such a soft floating witchery of sound
As twilight Elfins make, when they at eve
Voyage on gentle gales from Fairy-Land,
Where Melodies round honey-dropping flowers,
Footless and wild, like birds of Paradise,
Nor pause, nor perch, hovering on untamed wing!
O! the one Life within us and abroad,
Which meets all motion and becomes its soul,
A light in sound, a sound-like power in light,
Rhythm in all thought, and joyance everywhere—
Methinks, it should have been impossible
Not to love all things in a world so filled;
Where the breeze warbles, and the mute still air
Is Music slumbering on her instrument.

Is an excellent example of the rhythm of five beat iambic controlling and using the stresses of syllables to musical effect.

(and when Coleridge uses rhyme as well...see
Khubla Khan...wow!)

In stanza four He briefly plays around with a
kind of `music of the spheres` idea and then in the next stanza (religiously?) abandons it.

Hope you and Natalie are well (and Glenys)

Did a broadcast with Jemal and Linda last Wednesday, and was amazed to learn that Chester has been going for forty years (that`s
what I call dedication!)

Yes I very much like any rhymed poetry that is good, metrical poetry that is good, any rhymed metrical poetry that is good.

But equally the same is true with blank verse that is good, form in general that is good, free verse that is good.

I just like good poetry Harry Hehe.

Now what is good? Well we all have differing opinions on that.

30th of October - Chester Poets 8pm

The Boot Inn
9 Eastgate Row North,
CH1 1LQ Chester,
Cheshire

It would be nice to see you and Yvonne if you can make it. It's been too long. I'll pass on your kind words and best to Nat and Also to Glenys.

Looked at this again and been considering Anthony`s:

`rhyme is part of the toolbox not the whole toolbox..`

This is obviously true, but if so then what poetic `tool`
is it? Using the same figure I would say that rhyme is
the sonic `tuning fork` for the language of any rhymed
poem. (meter a stress tuning `fork` for blank verse.)

Apart from comic, or hip Hop, Rapper, stuff both have
almost disappeared from (serious) contemporary poetry.

As both tools were extensively used until fairly recently
(circa Philip Larkin for instance) why is this so?

Could it be that A...it`s unfashionable? B...it`s inferior?
(as a form) to the `Free stuff`? C...that it`s never taught
or encouraged in poetry workshops.? That there is some
sort of academic prejudice against it? Or something else?

I`m asking about an absence.

Anthony`s...poetry as the `play` of language against/with
sense or rhyme` Is valid about `rhymed `nonsense poetry`
(`play` against rhyme) or satirical poetry (`play` against
sense). `Playing` theme against theme can always done,
But poetic `play` is played against/with something staid
or orderly and `f`ree` would seem to be the opposite.

The numerous new recruits to poetry are making some
strong and valid points in the `Free` style most of them
are now using. I only wish that they should be taught to
study and employ some of the old time-tested ways of
doing it as well.

For me and the society from which I hail if a poem lacks music it is no poem at all.It is better to put it in a prose form because some times a prose also takes the adjective poetic.

I write rhyming poems and I also translate the rhyming classic poems in to Amharic,the working language of Ethiopia,the cradle land of mankind.
What you shared us in this piece is very much interesting and informative.
It is this weekend I joined 'write it out loud'.I am happy to meet knowledgeable people and brilliant poets.
Do you have poetry review columns?
Respectfully

Rhyme is a different challenge in an inflected language with lots of similar verb/noun endings like Amharic or (for instance) Russiann. Rhyme in English can too easily become tinkly and turn a serious poem into somethin musicboxy rather than musical. That's why off rhyme happened as well as free verse and blank verse. As for music composing by musical phrase rather than by metronome is something Piund recommended. And then it depends on your music. Mr, I'm a jazz fan. Dirty bebopper me...

I agree with Alem, in that I often love poems in which I can hear the music, particularly rhythm, but also assonance, alliteration and, often but necessarily rhyme. I don't agree with him that absence of music prevents it being a poem. The problem of translation of rhyme is a huge one. I have only translated from French into English, and have only once created a rhymed equivalent. That is a whole other area of discussion, into which I am happy to delve, as I find it fascinating.
I do remember the experience, during one of our famous weekends in Bordeaux, when one of our number, Gemma, read a non-rhyming poem - My Grandma painted her eyebrows on http://www.writeoutloud.net/profiles/gemmalees
- with such musicality that the French, who could not understand the words, wanted to translate it at the break, precisely because they had enjoyed the sound of the poem. One of their number then read the result out loud. During that break the discussion between themselves, and us and them, was fascinating.

I thought I had finished with this (who am I kiddin`?).

Reading some of Oscar Wilde recently made me think about the `aesthetic movement` (and the disrepute it got itself into)

The word itself really means beauty...which is perhaps what us rhymsters and rhythmers are trying to get at when we argue for rhyme and rhythm in poems.

Not only the `sweet` kind of beauty, but also something of what Yeats meant when he wrote `A terrible beauty is born`.?

`Beauty` covers a wide field from the `pretty` in Herrick and the diaphanous in Pope`s `Rape of the lock` to the deep stuff of Keats` and the majestic stuff of Milton.

All right, I know I am talking of some exalted stuff here, But today even the hopeless aims after it have vanished from the modern scene.

Isn`t it about time that they came back?

'BEAUTY' is as indeterminate as 'TRUTH'. And the search goes on, in all poetic genres, to offer individual insight into 'the SUBSTANCE OF LIFE'.

As each poet tries to express such personal ideas through language alone, surely the definition of Poetry as Art avoids division about structure.

What! No comeback? I languish ...........

On this very interesting thread.

During a recent prolonged bout of the flu I re-read Samuel Johnson`s comments on Pope, which included some very good points on the `sonar` aspects of the words of a poem, which are worth reading whatever `side` we may happen to think we are on. (That guy certainly had a `no messin` about` brain) When I get my head around what he said a bit more, I might just come back on this.

Heavy reading for a heavy infection?
I recall that Pope himself was a formidable
pen pusher, with no time for fools He and
the good Doctor would have provided some
entertainment duelling with words and opinions.

You`re right M.C, whenever I get sick I have this weird habit
of wanting to re-read heavy stuff.

Johnson, quoting Pope`s;

`The sound should seem an echo of the sense`

(from `An Essay on Criticism`)

Says that the number of actual onomatopoeic words
In English are actually very few, that there is little
flexibility in our language, and that many of the
resemblances we imagine (of the sound of words to
the sense) are `fancied`.

Although he allows something to the idea of motion
(slow or fast pace in line length or word) and doesn`t
say aught about alliteration or assonance, Johnson`s
`common sensical` approach to the subject made me
think about the whole thing again. (alliteration and
assonance can sometimes seem over–smooth in a
poem somewhat `skid over` the sound/sense thing).

I`d also just finished coughing my way through a re –
read of Eagleton`s `Literary Theory` (told you I was
weird) with it`s wade through the various attempts by
modern theories to try and pin down what we mean by
`Literature`. I was struck by what Johnson said about
(mere?) words and the absolute towsing that the now
out-dated structural Linguistics gave to the old ideas of
how words are chained into structural wholes…not to
mention the effect of the later Generative stuff with its
infinite number of sentences and innateness of language
…or the cognative linguists, who accept the innateness,
but deny that it is language specific?

I got quite interested in some of the structural stuff at
Uni and I think what I am trying to say is: Isn`t it about
time that the academics got down to using some of the
insights of the new linguistics in trying to identify what
we are attempting to get at when we talk about the form
of the elegance or `musical-ness of what we feel when
read - particularly the old `canonical` - poetry?..

Johnson, of course, was quite adept at recognising what he
termed the `numbers` images` harmony` and `vigour` of
Pope`s poetry…this is an example.





True Ease in Writing comes from Art, not Chance,
As those move easiest who have learn'd to dance,
'Tis not enough no Harshness gives Offence,
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;
Not so, when swift Camilla scours the Plain,
Flies o'er th'unbending Corn, and skims along the Main.

M.C.

I must have been off my rocker wading through all
that pseudo-scientific structural linguistic stuff trying
to `get at` the location of that felt word/sound `tuning`
that so many folk sense in the (particularly `canonical`)
poetry of the past but which defies all our attempts to
sufficiently locate it in the actual words -despite things
like alliteration and assonance (but where else can we go
to locate it except in the words?)

I think some of your comments on this thread about the
present day direction of the music scene itself have some
relevance of what has happened to poetry (not to mention
some of the avant- garde art stuff) an abandonment of all
what was once regarded as `pukka` and a fashion-driven
latching on to all that can be considered as `Free`.

I think all this has led to what Paxman called the present-
day irrelevance of most of todays poetry to the `panel of
the public` in that it has not got a role in their collective
lives…and needs to face an `inquisition` of itself.

Encouragingly – as sort of straws in the wind- I was reading
last night at an overwhelmingly `young` local gig and was
struck by the way rap style rhyme kept getting interjected into
sections of the predominantly `free` stuff, as though to fetch it
a bit more together.

Perhaps all hope lies in what Samuel Johnson – after being a bit
lukewarm about the rest of his poetry - said about Grays `Elegy`
` In the character of his `Elegy` I rejoice to concur with the common
reader; for by the common sense of readers uncorrupted with literary
prejudices, after all the refinements of subtlety and the dogmatism
of learning, must be finally decided all claim to poetical honours.`

(Which just goes to show folks…keep posting! (It only takes one)

Harry,
I recall that General Wolfe - the "hero of Quebec" - stated that he would rather have
written Gray's famous "Elegy" than won the
battle for which he is famous.
Certainly, the consistency of Gray's poem
through its many stanzas shows that it is more
about art than chance. You have to possess
the tools to construct anything worthwhile and
lasting. He need never have written anything
else. His immortality is guaranteed by lines
that cross the bounds of class and wealth
because they link the reality of humanity's common thread of mortality with hopes, dreams
and aspirations we all know about.

Thanks for the heads-up on this Steve; it's a fascinating article deftly and humorously written - well worth the time spent reading. I particularly liked:

"It has taken a long time for rhyme to return to favour. Rap and the rise of performance poetry have played a part in that return."

Is rhyme returning to popularity? Competition results would indicate the opposite!

"Of course there’s a political agenda – there always is: poets write poems because they have something urgent to say."

Often urgent, but just as often meaningless, banal and self-centred methinks . . .


"Here is Frau Freud, in mad lexical delight, listing every word she can think of for Penis – and at last, in a bout of new theory-making that would have given us a very different psychoanalysis, she drops Penis Envy and opts instead for Penis Pity. It’s a short poem – a loose sonnet – but it says as much as bookshelves of debate. The fact is that women don’t suffer from penis envy. (Actually or symbolically, practically or poetically). Only a man would think anyone could."

Penis pity; now there's a thought . . .

Regards,
A.E.

Steve and Anthony...Thanks!

(You know how I go on about rhyme) and this article is very interesting...particularly in that it actually gives examples of what Jeanette is talking about and so (unusually) we have something in front of us upon which we can make a judgement.

Before, though, could someone on the administration of
W.O.L. confirm that it is okay to reproduce (just the two examples) she gave of C.A.D`s poems?

Probably the last real refuge of rhyme was the
work of the top American song lyricists like
Hart, Porter and Cahn. The intricate rhyme
patterns weaved by Hart were and are a source
of justified admiration and leave many so-called poets far behind in being able to
say what is intended to be understood while
being supremely entertaining...a rare and
enviable combination.
Today's songwriters are - to use a footballing comparison - no better than the
Conference League, as are many so-called poets.
Disuse, misuse and plain inadequacy are the
prime suspects.

I had a look at this "psychology" thread and
one sentence in particular stood out for me:
"Both rhyme and meter(sic) led to enhanced
aesthetic appreciation, higher intensity in
processing and more positively perceived and
felt emotions with the latter finding mediated
by lexicality."
Who am I to disagree?

Steve,
`Phew` read the psychology thing (bit of a brainful)

I was struck by the conclusions about the pseudo - worded (nonsense?) metered stuff and it`s effect on the participants of `eliciting more positive emotions` and the suggested perceived parallel between the `chaotic` semantic content and the structure. (that the metered structure gave them the impression that there was some sense in nonsense)

Nonsense verse doesn`t pretend to be serious and -to be honest - most avant-garde stuff wouldn`t be seen dead in a decent meter. I get a bit concerned about some of these recent attempts to start identifying hidden and half rhymes in the modern `chopped up` stuff (its a bit like trying to filch bits of a `respectable` sister`s frock).

(For what can be rhythmically done with `chaotic content` see lines seven and eight of the Pope quote above...particularly the contrastive hard `r`s and rhymed line-ending of eight)

I`m delighted that so many people are actually `doing` poetry these days but I do wish that they would start to get back to the rhythmic basics.

Thinking of that painstakingly German (complement) psychology thing and literary theories called to mind A.J. Austin`s `Speech act Theory`which claims that certain types of speech are `Peformative` (poetry?)

It goes a little way to explain how when the testers` heard nonsense spoken in meter they had `positive emotions`)

It would also explain the wording and spoken delivery style of Pound and those other stentorian type poets.

I wonder if the general absence of it is the reason why so few of the general public are willing to listen to modern (serious) poetry without expressing boredom?..does the prevalent `free style` just sound a bit too `throw away`to them?

Churchill certainly used (and carefully rehearsed) rhythm and occasional poetical
references in his speeches...now recognised
as masterpieces of their kind. No other public
speaker since has equalled his ability in
making speeches that impressed so much. No wonder JFK praised his accomplishment in "marshalling the English language and sending
it to war".

Some poems rhyme.
Some poems don't.
Choose what you will
Or choose what you...

....Like?

Nothing wrong with rhyme. If you like to pretend you're living in the 19th , 18th, 17th, 16th or 15th centuries...

Or in the Rupert the Bear Annual

This has turned into one hell of a post.
I have to say though that I half wish someone would come up with something that rhymed AND didn't sound like medieval doings. Perhaps some new words would be needed.

So all the performance poets out there who rhyme are living in the past? Sounds like they're part of a long tradition, at any rate.

Delighted to see this thread livening up again

I was looking again at one of the excerpts in the Jeanette
Winterton thing about C.A.D.`s ``Thetis`` poem.

The excerpt reads:

I was wind, I was gas
I was all hot air, trailed
Clouds for hair.
I scrawled my name with a hurricane. When out of the blue
Roared a fighter plane.

(Just to show some awareness of what it`s `about`)

The poem THETIS gives a Feminist take on the story of a Greek
mythological Nerid (who can change shape at will) who finds
herself the victim of an ordered ambush in the squeeze of a
human who is not to let her wriggle from his grasp. She trys
various `shapes` to escape including a Coleridge-like albatross,
(including the cross-bow) and a Calvary up a sky-hill. Clipped by
the cross-bow she abandons the religious/mystic to shop for a
snakey size eight (mistake) But, as the squeeze is now a clasp, and
realising that she has now turned (herself?) into materialistic meat.
She spots the (boring?) `danger` and sinks into the a musically fishy
metamorphal aquatic form, whereupon, she fears the fisherman
and changes tune into a small game type of animality which gives
an opportunity to introduce taxidermically the kind of stuff...ing
that both precedes and procedes from what she is talking about.
The wind and gas aftermath suggest pregnancy and the fighter-
plane rebellion., but the goom wears asbestos, hopefully (wind?)
with a mask. The ending feels like the worst bits of one born every
minute ...The hyphen in the penultimate line balks the temptation
to put three dots between felt and when in the last line.

Male-wise, I think the final effect is : All right, girls we`ve got the jokes,
but let`s get back to the cleaving and clamping and babies, and all that :)
A serious (and I think - unintentionally - piteous) note is those last two
lines in that the inside (which causes all the problems) is precisely that
which cannot be turned inside out.

To get back to Winterton`s rhyming excerpt:

A ``normal`` rhyming would look like:

I was wind, I was gas, I was all hot air,
Trailed clouds for hair.
I scrawled my name with a hurricane.
When out of the blue roared a fighter plane.

I would agree that this would be out of kilter with the sort of
ad hoc rhyming (and in one section over-rhyming ) of the rest
of it.
(I was nervous about reproducing the poem here...which did
a bit of damage to the quotation mark thing)

I forgot to add that the ad hoc rhyming reminded me of the the sort of `grasped at` kind of opportunistic rap stuff at a young gig I was at recently

(How`s that for the 21st century, Steven?)

Yep, all the performance poets who rhyme are living in the past. Me though, I'm living in the 10th century, with Caedmon & the Beowulf poet and other performance poets. Or the times of BC with Catullus & Homer & Horace (none of whom rhymed in their original languages.) Or whenever Basho lived. Or the Psalmists of Israel. Or the 16th with Shakespeare's blank verse. Or the 19th with Rimbaud & Whitman. Bring back Sappho* I say!

We're all living in the past, but some of us go right back to the roots of poetry (did you know that the first poets to use concrete poetry were the ancient Greeks?)

*Sappho didn't rhyme? Criminal! How could she be the greatest lyric poet of her age (according to the ancients) and she didn't even rhyme? What did those ancient know anyway? They weren't even English!

Hello Steven,
Glad to hear you are mucking about in the `old English` stuff (And no doubt bringing it up to date) We were whipped through some of it during our -partly language- degree. Despite the archaic syntax, the sound
of the `warrior` stuff had a wonderfully forthright war-likeness about it that would be difficult to match in modern English. (Rap is a bit too protestive)

The classical stuff was quantative, and that short and long vowel stuff just doesn`t seem to fit English anyway.

Thinking about some of that old Norse and Saxon `warrior` stuff made me think of the grand warlike gusto it had (which seems to have completely disappeared in modern poetry) Despite the dire need for the `get yourself wrought up`type of individual courage today, there doesn`t seem to be much poetry about it around. Perhaps the sheer immensity of the big, nuclear bang and the aftermaths of the last two `mechanical` wars have blinded us to the fact that personal courage is still very much required. Even Wilfrid Owen - after the poem - willingly `got on with it` and fought to his death.

Unfortunately someone like me - who wanted to enjoy all that old `gung ho` stuff - always got a conscience about the unavoidable blood letting that goes along with it. (Me calling myself a Christian) But eventually this poem (by Francis Thompson) put my mind at rest.

THE VETERAN OF HEAVEN.

O CAPTAIN of the wars, whence won Ye so great scars?
In what fight did Ye smite, and what manner was the foe?
Was it on a day of rout they compassed Thee about,
Or gat Ye these adornings when Ye wrought their overthrow?

‘’Twas on a day of rout they girded Me about,
They wounded all My brow, and they smote Me through the side:
My hand held no sword when I met their armèd horde,
And the conqueror fell down, and the Conquered bruised his pride.’

What is this, unheard before, that the Unarmed make war,
And the Slain hath the gain, and the Victor hath the rout?
What wars, then, are these, and what the enemies,
Strange Chief, with the scars of Thy conquest trenched about?

‘The Prince I drave forth held the Mount of the North,
Girt with the guards of flame that roll round the pole.
I drave him with My wars from all his fortress-stars,
And the sea of death divided that My march might strike its goal.

‘In the keep of Northern Guard, many a great daemonian sword
Burns as it turns round the Mount occult, apart:
There is given him power and place still for some certain days,
And his name would turn the Sun’s blood back upon its heart.’

What is Thy Name? Oh, show!—‘My Name ye may not know;
’Tis a going forth with banners, and a baring of much swords:
But My titles that are high, are they not upon My thigh?
“King of Kings!” are the words, “Lord of Lords!”
It is written “King of Kings, Lord of Lords”.’

(By the way, there is a site called, I think, 13 pages which has a good article about the decorative abilities of some of that very old Saxon stuff.)

I think Anglo-Saxon has had a profound effect on modern poetry. It's where a lot of the rhythms of good free verse and modernist poetry especially derive. Ezra Pound did a great version of the Seafarer, TS Eliot, Basil Bunting and David Jones all drew on its metrical soundworld. Gerard Manley Hopkin was perhaps the earliest, and he also drew on Welsh metrics (as did David Jones) and a lot of early 20th century poetry and right up to today have drawn on it to create some great poems (Brigflats, probably the greatest British poem of the 20th century, for instance.)

Other influences also come in - Chinese poetry in Pound, Persisan poetry in Bunting, French in a lot of people, even the Troubador poets (Pound again.) It's mixed in with a lot of contemporary stuff of course, but it's there in the rhythms and the language: 'Brag, sweet tenor bull/ descant of Rawthey's madrigal' is as Anglo Saxon as they come.

I see that this thread has now eclipsed WDW Red Wheelbarrow 132-130 in the popularity stakes. Come on you reds??

Splendid interview with Clive James in the Observer today http://www.theguardian.com/uk/culture. James is a very much a rhyme and metre man - and a very good one, too. Here's a snippet from the interview that I found interesting: "He says he divides his poems into 'lovelies' and 'funnies', which sometimes take shape on the page so fast, he says with a laugh, 'that it would be giving away a trade secret to admit how swiftly they can get written'. "

I`m glad someone else has re-started this.

I`ve wondered how a ``free`` style could be
`incorporated` into a rhymed style, and both
preserve what was best about them...I did
an experimental poem once attempting to
do this..The idea was of a three line stanza
poem where the first and last line of each
stanza rhymed - and you could do what the
hell you wanted with the middle line.

Here are three of the stanzas:


Why I could feel
The shock of spring-seas, bursting against a far coast,
Vibrant under my heel –


For I knew
Who, round the corner of the street,
Would swing like a sail round a headland into view.


Vied
With the answer pounding from within –
I was flung wide,

Does anyone know of any (successful) other attempts