Creating Meaning
Creating Sound
Alliteration, Assonance, and Consonance
Using Form
- Sonnet
- Sestina
There are five standard metrical units, each identified by the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables. An unstressed syllable is represented by a "da", while a stressed syllable is represented by a "DA".
| Iambic | da DA | prevent |
| Trochaic | Da da | football |
| Anapestic | da da DA | comprehend |
| Dactylic | DA da da | cheerfully |
| Spondaic | DA DA | knick-knack |
A foot is a measured unit in poetry. Depending on how many feet there are per line, the line will be labeled with one of the following words:
| One | monometer |
| Two | dimeter |
| Three | trimeter |
| Four | tetrameter |
| Five | pentameter |
| Six | hexameter |
| Seven | heptameter |
| Eight | octameter |
To find the rhythm of the line, find the pattern of the stressed and unstressed syllables, and then see how many times that pattern repeats itself throughout the line. For example, if the meter is trochaic, (Da da), and there are five sets of Da da in the line (for a total of ten syllables), the rhythm would be iambic pentameter.
Assignment:
Identify the type of metrical foot in each of the words below. Use a dictionary if necessary.
1. happy
2. misty
3. broken
4. angrily
5. lyrical
6. money
7. everything
8. water
9. memory
10. destitute
11. restlessly
12. concerned
13. flexible
14. wander
15. repair
Determine the metrical pattern in the following lines
I join with you, my love, my wife
Our hearts as vast as blanket sands
That know the tides and weather strife
As partners firm cross ocean's hands
- Raina Tokar
He sings not in the patterned night
And all the silent ways of dawn
Are empty of his crested flight.
-Jacquie Willette
Now's the time for me to leave you
Make my way and meet my trials
Learn and live and dance and cry some
Do not wait for me this while
-A.J. Jordan
