[Carol Trese]

In a recent post, an author replaced the "feminine endings." Who can show me some examples of when and why they don't work or why they do? Maybe this is a semester long course...I don't mean to be asking for the moon, but just a couple pointers might help. Many thanks.

[Mike Todd]

Carol—

Here is an example of a poem in which feminine endings "work". That is to say, they work for me. They may not work for you, and they may not work for others. The poem is "Reluctance" by Robert Frost:

Out through the fields and the woods
And over the walls I have wended;
I have climbed the hills of view
And looked at the world, and descended;
I have come by the highway home,
And lo, it is ended.

The leaves are all dead on the ground,
Save those that the oak is keeping
To ravel them one by one
And let them go scraping and creeping
Out over the crusted snow,
When others are sleeping.

And the dead leaves lie huddled and still,
No longer blown hither and thither;
The last lone aster is gone;
The flowers of the witch-hazel wither;
The heart is still aching to seek,
But the feet question ‘Whither?’

Ah, when to the heart of man
Was it ever less than a treason
To go with the drift of things,
To yield with a grace to reason,
And bow and accept the end
Of a love or a season?

*

Feminine endings are a complement to masculine endings. Lines with a masculine ending conclude on a beat; except where enjambment is an overriding force, there is a sense of finality or completeness. The quale of masculine endings is that of a door closing shut, whereas the quale of feminine endings is that of a door—a saloon door, if you like—swinging to and creaking back open a little, or of a gymnast tottering forward after a dismount.

Getting back to the Frost poem, the feminine endings "work" here because their quale energises the poem's sense. The sense (of unwillingness to let things go) can be heard—and felt—in the sound of the feminine rhymes.

Speaking generally, when wondering how or why a particular kind of prosodic element "works", the first thing to come to terms with is the quale (or qualia) of that element. This is easier said than done, of course, and not something that can be gleaned from a textbook. Immersion in poetry is the only way.

[Carol Trese]

Thank you very much Mike! I appreciate your informative response. The spirit of generosity and willingness to teach that so many bright people bring to this site takes me happily away from my day job! Frost's "Reluctance" is a painful beauty.

[A. E. Stallings]

It's often said that feminine endings are better for lighter or very musical effects, but these are generalizations with lots of exceptions. When mixed with masculine endings, they often work better in a set pattern, such as in the Frost, rather than mixed willy-nilly. This (Shakespeare sonnet) is one of my favorite examples of feminine endings (almost exclusively, though I don't count 2 & 4 as feminine), that seem to have the effect here of a sigh of resignation:

Farewell! thou art too dear for my possessing,
And like enough thou know'st thy estimate:
The charter of thy worth gives thee releasing;
My bonds in thee are all determinate.
For how do I hold thee but by thy granting?
And for that riches where is my deserving?
The cause of this fair gift in me is wanting,
And so my patent back again is swerving.
Thyself thou gavest, thy own worth then not knowing,
Or me, to whom thou gavest it, else mistaking;
So thy great gift, upon misprision growing,
Comes home again, on better judgment making.
Thus have I had thee, as a dream doth flatter,
In sleep a king, but waking no such matter.

[Susan McLean]

Feminine rhymes can work in two different ways. In serious verse, the key effect is of falling or leaving something hanging at the end. The challenge is to handle the extra unstressed syllable in a way that doesn't make the reader stumble at the beginning of the next line. You can either use the unstressed syllable in place of one at the beginning of the next line or in addition to the unstressed one at the beginning of the next line, but there must not be any ambiguity about where the stresses fall.

Feminine rhymes are more of a challenge than masculine ones and call more attention to themselves. They are great for showing off in humorous verse (the more unexpected the rhyme, the better, and the more syllables in the feminine rhyme, the funnier it tends to be). Byron's "intellectual/henpecked you all" is justly famous and is typical of what he regularly pulls off in Don Juan. Ogden Nash is also a master of polysyllabic rhymes.

Susan

[Petra Norr]

The challenge is to handle the extra unstressed syllable in a way that doesn't make the reader stumble at the beginning of the next line. You can either use the unstressed syllable in place of one at the beginning of the next line or in addition to the unstressed one at the beginning of the next line, but there must not be any ambiguity about where the stresses fall.

Maybe I have the wrong idea about metrics, but I've always thought that an extra unstressed syllable has no bearing whatsoever on how the next line starts. The meter begins and ends with the line. In Shakespeare's sonnets there are several cases where a line ends with an extra unstressed syllable
and then is followed by a line that has an initial trochee and four iambs. Here are just two examples:


Till whatsoever star that guides my moving,
Points on me graciously with fair aspect,

An eye more bright than theirs, less false in rolling,
Gilding the object whereupon it gazeth;

And here is one from Tennyson:

The nightingale, with long and low preamble,
Warbled from yonder knoll of solemn larches,

The same principle works when using the modern-day "headless iamb". That is, the use of the headless line is not dependent on how the preceding line ended. It's perfectly okay to use a headless line even if the preceding one does not end with an extra unstressed syllable.

[Carol Trese]

Petra, Please talk more about "headless iambs." What is a headless line? I could just google it, but I hope I am not the only ignorant one here to be enlightened. Thanks!

[Mark Allinson]

Carol, a "headless" (or "acephalous") line in iambics is one which purposely violates the meter by omitting the first syllable - so instead of beginning daDAH, it begins with DAH.

I used one myself in a recent TDE post - which begins:

Birth’s another kind of death
a fetus-killing rush of breath;

You can see that the first line is a syllable shorter than the second. It's just another mode of metrical variation.

Re "feminine" endings (sometimes called "trochaic endings") - I always think of this:

That strain again! - it had a dying fall.
O, it came o'er my ear like the sweet sound
That breathes upon a bank of violets,
Stealing and giving odour.


Says Orsino, in Shakespeare's Twelfth Night.

And the feminine rhyme seems to me to have a dying fall. So they tend to suit sad or melancholic themes.

===========

Edited back to add this example of a good use of the "dying fall" effect:

Spring and Fall

(to a young child)


Margaret, are you grieving
Over Goldengrove unleaving?
Leaves, like the things of man, you
With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?
Ah! as the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By & by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;
And yet you wíll weep & know why.
Now no matter, child, the name:
Sorrow's springs are the same.
Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed
What héart héard of, ghóst guéssed:
It is the blight man was born for,
It is Margaret you mourn for.



– Gerard Manley Hopkins

[David Rosenthal]

Originally Posted by Petra Norr

That is, the use of the headless line is not dependent on how the preceding line ended. It's perfectly okay to use a headless line even if the preceding one does not end with an extra unstressed syllable.

I agree with this and everything you said, Petra, but i have to admit, an enjambment from a feminine ending to a headless iamb can work to great effect.

In any case, I think with all things poetic, hard-and-fast rules will often fail you. They real key, I think, is to be intentional about what your doing sonically. That is, if you end a line with a feminine ending, be aware you are doing it, have a reason why you are doing it, and be convinced it sounds good in the context of the poem. If it does, no reader worth writing for will care what kind of ending it is.

David R.

[Petra Norr]

Carol - Mark gave you a good example of a headless iamb. You can find out more in the links I gave you earlier, which explain it far better than I can.

David - Yes, an enjambment from a feminine ending to a headless iamb works well. If you read the lines in a continuous stream it will sound like there is no break in the iambic meter. But the point I was trying to make is that it's also okay if there is a break, so if you want to begin a headless line after a line that ended on a beat, go ahead. The main reason for using substitutions like the headless iamb, initial trochee, etc. is to vary the meter. If, on the other hand, a poet always strives for a smooth "iambic transition" from one line to another, then there's little point in using variations at all.
Anyway, you're right that sonics/rhythm play a big part. Ultimately your metrical choices should also fit your intentions rythmically and sonically.