[Mark Allinson]

I am working on a piece that I would like to test on the board at the end of the week (Saturday), but where should I post it?

The poem is an unrhymed accentual tetrameter, with no discernible rhythmical pattern (and thus no apparent meter), but I believe that it qualifies as “metrical” since I have measured four beats in every line.

However, since the rhythms are essentially prose rhythms, many would say that it belongs on the Non-Met board. It does read like “lineated prose”, but prose is rarely measured in four beats per line. And I believe the beat pattern has its effect on the reader, which is why I didn’t do it in FV.

But if the poem’s metricality (or otherwise) is going to be the main point of discussion on the TDE thread when posted, I would rather avoid all that and post it to Non-Met where the issue will vanish, and the poem may be read as a poem.

So – where does this thing belong?

[David Anthony]

That's a tricky one, Mark.

[Maryann Corbett]

Mark, for what it's worth, I write a lot of unrhymed rough accentual tet. The second poem on this page is an example.

I workshop these regularly on Met.

[Mark Allinson]

Thanks, David and Maryann.

Maryann, I think your form is closer to acc-syl, actually. You seem to have no more than 8 syllables per line - my acc-tet has variable syllable counts from 7-10 per line - I don't bother counting them.

And your examples (which I enjoyed very much) have a definite rhythmical swing to them. They do seem quite metrical to me.

So I think we are talking about a different form - and a form which looks and sounds a lot more like FV (but really isn't).

[Rose Kelleher]

The poem is an unrhymed accentual tetrameter

Um, accentual meter goes in metrical or Deep End, right?

What am I missing?

[Chris Childers]

My guess is that Mark means that he considers it metrical, but that his scansion is so loopy that none of us will agree with him. Still, if it's really metrical, post on a metrical board; accentual meters shouldn't throw us off too much, if they're well done. If however everyone is confused by the meter and no one can hear it, expect to be informed.

Chris

[Quincy Lehr]

Well, we all have our little ways of dealing with those poems that fall in the interstices, with the Met/TDE-Non-Met divide here does not accommodate well. Or at least those of us who write pieces that have something of a foot in both camps, whether through loose metre (e.g. Mark here) a combination of metrical and non-metrical bits (various longer pieces of mine) and no doubt some examples I'm forgetting. I find such pieces tend to get the best reads on boards that have both metrical and free verse on them, where there's less expectation for a piece to be one or the other.

Quincy

[Mark Allinson]

Thanks, Rose and Chris.

Maybe it's the absence of end-rhyme that makes this thing seem so flat (rhythmically speaking) - it seems even blanker than blank verse - almost like a syllabic.

It doesn't seem (to me) to have any "song" to it, unlike Maryann's examples.

Anyway, I will probably post it on TDE, and if necessary it can be moved to Non-met.

===========

Edit: Thanks, Quincy - cross-posted.

[This message has been edited by Mark Allinson (edited January 23, 2008).]

[Mark Allinson]

Whoops!

I must apologise to Maryann - I only read that first poem - and didn't see the second, which you CLEARLY specified.

Sorry.

Yes, that is more like my thing. And if you 'shopped that here, this one should be all right.

(Just an aside, Maryann - do you scan all of "High" as tet, as I would read some lines as tri. We could discuss it by PM, if you care to.)