Taming the elusive Iamb
Note: In all of the following, I have indicated stressed syllables in bold.
My woods and fields
An iamb is a two-syllable metrical foot where the stress is on the second syllable:
da dum
A trochee is a two-syllable metrical foot where the stress falls on the first syllable:
da dum
Robert Frost’s poem, “Stopping By Woods on a Snowy Evening” is composed of iambs:
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
For an example of dactyls check out Henry Wadsworth Longfellow‘s “Song of Hiawatha”
-
- Should you ask me, whence these stories?
- Whence these legends and traditions,
- With the odors of the forest,
- With the dew and damp of meadows,
And now Michele’s first stanza:
We claim our fears and ghosts by what we do,
paths drag us into, not by accident,
territory steep in our deep taboo.*
*Note: there are several ways to read this line — this is one.
So, lines one and two consist of nothing but iambs, but line 3 starts with two trochees.
One way to figure out the meter is just what I have done above: read the lines aloud, then underline or bold the stressed syllables, then see what you have. Another is to clap as you read: clap on all the stressed syllables while at the same time keeping track of whether this matches your pattern.
Another is to imitate a well-known rhyme or song. One of the only successful rhymed stories I wrote followed the rhythm of a nursery rhyme (unfortunately I’ve forgotten which one). Here are the first couple of stanzas. Can you help identify the song or nursery rhyme I tried to follow?
Old Tom Troll
had a hole by a bridge,
not far from the River Dee,
a lonely hole
not fit for a Troll,
and full of damp debris.
So Old Tom Troll
went out for a stroll
to find new holes to see.
Old Tom Troll
had a hole by a bridge,
not far from the River Dee,
a lonely hole
not fit for a Troll,
and full of damp debris.
So Old Tom Troll
went out for a stroll
to find new holes to see.
annewestlund
feywriter
lin52
Margaret Fieland
Margaret
Michele
Poetic Muselings 