Rhythm in poetry is based on the degree of emphasis--"stress"--received by various syllables, and pauses of various length. It is partially dependent on the individual interpretation or "performance" of the reader, but the writer does many things to encourage the reader to perform his or her line in a desired way. Of course all the ways in which meaning and other aspects of sound that we have studied are used in the poem affect interpretation, and therefore rhythm. Also, following or departing from regular sentence patterns in English--for instance, using a question or exclamation--affects rhythm. Most specifically, the use of an underlying meter or other pattern based on syllables and line length affects rhythm. In the following exercises, you will practice recognizing meter and other patterns (syllable count; stressed syllable count; cadence), and of course remembering their names, but most importantly, you will try to hear rhythm more precisely than you need to do simply to recognize meters.
The key difference is that meters assume that there are only two kinds of syllables, unstressed and stressed; in fact, however, we can hear four different levels of stress, as illustrated in the phrase "Telephone booth." We can likewise hear four different kinds of pause, illustrated in writing by the lightest pause, which is the space between words; light pauses such as those marked by commas or places where the voice drops; heavier pauses marked by dashes, semicolons, colons, and parentheses, where we know that the sentence has taken a major turn but we also know it's not complete; and final pauses, which we mark by question marks, periods, or exclamation points. Note that though we have some conventions requiring punctuation of a particular kind which may not be what we "hear," we can usually get the meaning and the punctuation right by assuming these connections. But perhaps you are wondering about "telephone booth." The strongest stress in that phrase is on "Tel" and the weakest or lightest is on the "uh" between "tel" and "phone." The syllable "phone" gets more stress than "e" but less than the separate word, "booth," which gets less emphasis than "tel." Now suppose you had a rather weird poem containing the following line: "Telephone booths were scrawled with truths." Analyzing the meter, you would distinguish just between stressed and unstressed syllables, ignoring pauses (also called caesuras) and forgetting about the fact that some stressed syllables are more stressed than others. You would "scan" this line more or less like this: TELephone BOOTHS were SCRAWLED with TRUTHS. The pattern is ' x x ' x ' x ' (using x for unstressed, ' for stressed). To analyze the rhythm, you might put in 4 1 2 3/ 2 3 /1 4// (using 4 for strongest stress, 1 for weakest; space for weakest pause, /// for final pause--I'm assuming here that the line does not end in a period).
PHYSICAL ANALYSIS OF RHYTHM AND METER IS NOT IMPORTANT IN ITSELF!!!!! It is useful only to the extent that it helps you read a poem intelligently and therefore appreciate its emotional and intellectual content. When you are analyzing an actual poem to enjoy and interpret it, then, you need to find out what patterns of syllables and stresses and line lengths it has, and you need to analyze in the actual meter of crucial or confusing or especially interesting lines, but you certainly don't need to go on and on about the rhythm and meter. This portfolio is like a fire drill--something that, hopefully, you won't have to use too often in real life!
So: (A) Figure out the METER or other pattern (syllable count, stresses per lines) in each of the following passages. One is in free verse. Then figure out the actual RHYTHM--variations of amount of stress and uses of differing kinds of pause--in the lines in bold type (the last 3 of example 1, all of example 2, the last 6 of example 3, all of example 4, the last word in example 5, l. 3 plus lines 4-7).
1. Because I could not stop for Death--
He kindly stopped for me--
The Carriage held but just Ourselves--
And Immortality.
We slowly drove--He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility--
(ma199)
2. For the angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And breathed in the face of the foe as
he passed;
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and
chill,
And their hearts but once heaved--and for ever
grew still! (sc 404)
3. you have to come back you say
this is rich and heavy
like good food
you say here
are our poems
smiling as your next words
are drowned in tambourines
and harsh songs of salvation
blasting from loudspeakers
lamposted below the window
for a moment the hymns
from the corner tabernacle
outdrum the cadence
of the parade (tw475)
4. To write a blues song
is to regiment riots
and pluck gems from graves (tw264)
5. if there are any heavens my mother will (all by herself) have
one. It will not be a pansy heaven nor
a fragile heaven of lilies-of-the-valley but
it will be a heaven of blackred roses
my father will be (deep like a rose
tall like a rose)
standing near my
(swaying over her
silent)
(ma450)
(B) Invent an example of each of the following "feet":
1. anapest
2. dactyl
3. iamb
4. spondee
5. troche
(C) The following list of prefixes for the word "meter" is in alphabetical order; rearrange it in numerical order: di hepta hexa mono penta tetra tri.