As someone here has mentioned - and it needs mentioning again - if we could hear poets reading their poems a great deal of the metrical problems we perceive in their work would fall away. Even within 50 miles from where I live there are regional variations in speaking that can add or subtract a syllable, speed up or slow down, or skim over or prolong a phrase. The fun of metrics is to stretch what can be done within the line, and sometimes on the page this variation doesn't always come across. Of course it has to be said 99% of poems are read not heard, but it's worth thinking about.
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