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Unread 04-07-2012, 05:24 AM
Roger Slater Roger Slater is offline
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That's an interesting if familiar observation. Of course, it explains only why a poet might wish to write in form, not why a reader might wish to read it. If form is a tool to prompt the poet to make interesting or worthwhile connections, why shouldn't the poet proceed, after those connections are made, to rewrite the poem in free verse? I would think that part of the answer is that the surprising connections are also, in some way, validated by being embodied in the form that caused the poet to stumble across them. Meter and rhyme lend credence and authority to what is being said and have some sort of legtimizing force or power of their own. That's why magic spells tend to rhyme, no?
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