Name ___________________________________________________________Period ______Date___________________
Poetic Meter Assignment
Assignment: Scan the following lines. Decide if they’re iambic, trochaic, anapestic, dactylic, or spondaic; then, describe the line
lengths as monometer, dimeter, etc.; for each, your answer will be something like “anapestic trimeter.” Pay attention to the line
breaks (identified by / in the line).
1.
________________________ This is the forest primeval./ The murmuring pines and the hemlocks,
2.
______________________The Assyrian came down like a wolf on the fold,/And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold.
3.
________________________In Flanders fields the poppies grow/Between the crosses, row on row.
4.
________________________The Curfew tolls the knell of parting day
5.
________________________O well for the fisherman’s boy,/That he shouts with his sister at play!
6.
________________________How sleep the Brave who sink to rest.
7.
________________________All the web of pain.
8.
________________________And the stately ships go on/To their haven under the hill
9.
________________________Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary . . .
10. ________________________So all day long the noise of battle rolled
11. ________________________To be or not to be; that is the question
12. ________________________Just for a riband to stick in his coat
13. ________________________The dew was falling fast, the stars began to blink
14. ________________________And its pleasures in all their new lustre begin
15. ________________________The long light shakes
16. ________________________Double, double, toil and trouble,/Fire burn and cauldron bubble
17. ________________________Where he could find the strongest oak
18. ________________________Love again, song again, nest again, young again
19. ________________________A jug of wine, a loaf of bread—and thou
20. ________________________Upon those boughs which shake against the cold
21.
Thus I
Pass by
And die:
As One
Unknown
And gone:
I’m made
A shade,
And laid
I’ th’ grave:
There have
My cave,
Where tell
I dwell.
Farewell.
22.
The idle life I lead
Is like a pleasant sleep,
Wherein I rest and heed
The dreams that by me sweep
23.
The hills, the meadows, and the lakes,
Enchant not for their own sweet sakes.
24.
Riddle
They head the list
of bad to bet on
But I insist
They’re worse to get on.
25.
Yes, Din! Din! Din!
You Lazarushian-leather Gunga Din!
Though I've belted you and flayed you,
By the livin' Gawd that made you,
You're a better man than I am, Gunga Din!
TURN ONTO THE BEAT – Meter, Rhythm and Scansion
DEFINITIONS:
SCANSION:
SYLLABLE:
FOOT:
CAESURA:
The art of marking a poem to show the metrical units of which it is composed.
The smallest metrical unit – two kinds, accented and unaccented (/u).
A group of two or more syllables.
A natural pause within a line of poetry.
TYPES OF FEET:
IAMBIC (iamb): unaccented, accented (u /)
along, defeat, enlist, divide
The curfew marks the knell of parting day.
TROCHAIC (trochee): accented, unaccented (/ u)
section, forward, conquer, shipment, gather
DACTYLIC (dactyl): one accented, two unaccented (/ u u)
unaware, wonderful, columbine, applesauce, happiness, satisfy
ANAPESTIC (anapest): two unaccented, one accented (u u /)
disappear, interrupt, with his hat; on the left; so it goes
SPONDAIC (spondee): two accented (/ /) shut up, come here, right now, heartbreak, childhood
PYRRHIC (very rare): two unstressed syllables (u u)
MORE ABOUT METER: Each line scanned must have two identifications; the type of foot and the number of feet.
Once you have identified the type of foot, go back and count the number of STRESSED syllables and then locate that
number in Greek below (or is it “all Greek” to you?)
1 = MONOMETER
5 = PENTÁMETER
2 = DIMETER
6 = HEXÁMETER
3 = TRIMETER
7 = HEPTÁMETER
4 = TETRÁMETER
8 = OCTÁMETER
JUST FOR FUN:
Trochee trips from long to short;
From long to long in solemn sort.
Slow spondee stalks, strong foot! Yet ill able
Ever to come up to Dactyl’s tri syllable.
Iambics march from short to long;
With a leap and abound the swift anapest throng.
--Samuel Taylor Coleridge
IF YOU NEED MORE HELP, see XJK starting on Page 575.