[John Riley]

Living Will

This is for when you first hear the clink of chains rattling,
or the release and squeeze of wild wind collapsing,
or the words you speak become fast hours,
or the night says to stop, stand tall, and flare,

or a crow turns, flies toward two ravens,
or you are left empty of what was creation,
or you take what you need from the wrong book,
or you are seized by the nose, a fish on a hook.

[Yves S L]

John,

I reckon you can kind of get away with approximating rhyme and meter with shorter lines, but with longer lines there is more time and space for things for things to sound incoherent. I also question the abstractness of L6 which might work as a contrast to the concreteness of the other lines, but for me does not quite work because I don't reckon the line is strong enough on its own, nor does it have the meter behind it that would make it sound more convincing.

[Mark McDonnell]

approximating rhyme and meter

I couldn’t disagree more. There are those poems that are obviously working in or striving for a very specific metre or rhyme scheme and therefore it’s usually clear when said metre or rhyme scheme hits a bump in the road. That’s where the nuts and bolts of metrical poetry forums can come in handy. And then there are poems, like this one, whose echoes and rhythms might be less easily discernible. Is this a metrical poem? I feel a pulse and a lilt when I read it. Could I analyse its metre and make every line conform to metrical "rules"? Possibly not, I see no reason to try.* (see below) Do I sometimes wish the met and non-met boards were merged to accommodate this grey area? Yes, but I can see the objections. Are there hundreds of examples of well-known, outstanding poems that fall into this grey area? Yes.

*Does this poem feel absolutely right when I read it? Yes.

[Roger Slater]

Free verse poems also have a "pulse and a lilt," Mark. All good poems, in my humble opinion, have a sort of music and rhythm to them. Music and rhythm are not exclusive to metrical poems. Meter is just one way of achieving the pulse and the lilt. One may observe that a given poem is not "metrical" without suggesting that the poem lacks music, pulse, or lilt.

Whether John's poem is "metrical" or not doesn't really affect the verdict on how good or bad the poem is, but by posting it in a "metrical" forum he was saying that he considers the poem to be metrical and was inviting comments about whether or not the meter conformed to metrical rules and standards. (I agree with you that the poem sounds right and that there are no "bumps" that can be ascribed to a lapse in meter. My post is simply to take issue with a definition of "meter" that equates it with any kind of rhythm at all).

[Yves S L]

Mark,

You are not disagreeing with me, but are simply making your own definitions and points about metrics, while possibly emotively defending a friend. What I said was fine. You can get away with approximating rhyme and meter with a shorter line, because you will stay hovering around 3 and 4 beats if you are vaguely more rhythmic than prose rhythms, or 2 and 3 beats if the line is especially short; but around about the length of line that typically contains 5 beats it gets harder to sound more coherent (probably a function of short-term working memory), if you have already set up an expectation of some manner of regularity (by, say, posting it on Eratosphere' metrical boards).

However, I have an awful time detecting sapphics (they just collapse into prose rhythms for me at first sight), so there might be a regular rule set being applied that I cannot naturally feel; but generally, I feel any kind of rhythm just fine, whether or not I consider it regular.

I don't think it would be at all useful to merge the met and non-met boards, because it is difficult already to get specific feedback, without making it more ambiguous what kind of feedback you are looking for. There is not really a grey area, because we have centuries of examples of practice: rhythmic is not necessarily metrical, and some metrical poems have boring rhythms, because rhythms are more what you do on top of your rhythmic grid, pattern of pulses (that is the definition from music anyways).

[John Riley]

Hey, I just checked in and saw this. I’ll have to come back later.

I do want to take time to say if you’re being “emotive” to a friend stop! Everyone here knows, I hope, that I can take criticism.

Of course, no one is doing that. But on the off-chance I thought it should be mentioned. Beat away!

[Mary Meriam]

People keep telling me to sign a living will. I'd rather give them your poem.

I wouldn't call this metrical, because there isn't a repeating pattern. I think it's important, educationally, to make the distinction and have separate forums.

Or maybe I'm wrong. The poem seems to pulse and lilt with sporadic spondee-ishness:
chains rattling,
wild wind
fast hours,
stand tall

crow turns
two ravens,
left empty
wrong book,

If this is a metrical form, I'm not aware of it, which could make it John's invention.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by John Riley

Living Will

This is for when you first hear the clink of chains rattling,
or the release and squeeze of wild wind collapsing,
or the words you speak become fast hours,
or the night says to stop, stand tall, and flare,

or a crow turns, flies toward two ravens,
or you are left empty of what was creation,
or you take what you need from the wrong book,
or you are seized by the nose, a fish on a hook.

I'm glad you posted this in Met first as the discussion was definitely relevant for me. I'm trying to figure that forum out. It sounds like, for the most part, there's an expectation of regularity there.

As for my usual non-met critique of your poems. I really enjoyed the first six lines, but the last two don't quite feel as strong, as if you were running out of material. The first six have a kind of complexity and mystique that say something, but don't say it all. Where the final two, it just feels like something's missing. And the final one comes across a bit like a punchline.

I'd add, and I should have added in your last thread, that these are just suggestions for things you can do. This one, and your last one, work as they are, but what I've pointed out are things you could look at.

And at the same time, I'm becoming more sympathetic to the need for rhythmic regularity in non-met. Many of the choices in both met and non-met seem to come down to - this phrase fits in this place, and it's difficult to do better. So it's great for me to make these recommendations, but finding stronger alternatives isn't always easy, or possible.

With your final two lines, they work in the sense that they don't sound too outlandish in reference to the rest of the poem. It'd be great to try to add a little more mystique and style to them, but you'd need to make sure they still fit with the rest of the poem, not an easy task.

[Carl Copeland]

Originally Posted by Nick McRae

I'm glad you posted this in Met ... I'm trying to figure that forum out. It sounds like, for the most part, there's an expectation of regularity there.

I’d feel more comfortable over there if what you said was true, Nick. There’s actually a strong faction that like their meter irregular enough that I might miss it if I wasn’t looking. Same with rhyme. My goal, though, isn’t to feel comfortable, but to stretch myself, and form over there gets lots of stretching.

[Nick McRae]

Originally Posted by Carl Copeland

I’d feel more comfortable over there if what you said was true, Nick. There’s actually a strong faction that like their meter irregular enough that I might miss it if I wasn’t looking. Same with rhyme. My goal, though, isn’t to feel comfortable, but to stretch myself, and form over there gets lots of stretching.

Yea, I've picked up on that too. It's interesting as this was one of the questions I asked about metrical poetry a few months ago, but I seem to have landed on my answer.

At the end of the day we're trying to make art, not fit poems into a box, but a poetry forum might not handle that distinction so easily. Maybe if we're looking for metrical critique, we post in met, if we're not, we post in non-met.