Let’s do the poem:
I'm going out to clean the pasture spring;
I'll only stop to rake the leaves away
Sing-songy, kinda? I’ll break the suspense— you wait in vain for a three-syllable word.
I don't really agree that it's sing-songy -- both sound so much like something someone might just happen to say, never realizing he was speaking in iambs. Also, I think the first line in modifying one noun (spring) with another (pasture) diminishes the apparent regularity of the first line -- pasture gets more emphasis than a mere trochaic adjective would get.
You could go for pages through this “prosodic genius” without stumbling on one…then it would be a proper name, or an animal.
Well, the first poem I turned to ["Snow"] had 2 in the first 4 lines 'listening' in the first line and disheveled in the fourth. You're right that he keeps the number down, but I don't find him monotonous
(And wait to watch the water clear, I may):
Even Golias would have a tough time with this rhyme-driven inversion. I doubt whether this is legitimate New England usage. The parentheses don’t help.
Well, I'd read this, not as rhyme driven inversion, but as a resistance to being pinned down (I may, then again maybe I won't)
I shan't be gone long. -- You come too.
“Shan’t”, I take it, is something someone in New England might have said at some time— about as bracing as reading Robert Burns (UGH!)…I’m proud of my Scottish ancestors, too— but not because they couldn’t speak English.
“You come too” is something a ‘tard might say.
Not sure what your problems are here. You don't object to all contractions, do you? Probably no one now would say shan't, but that's because we no longer mark the distinction between 'shall' and 'will' in American English. 'You come too' is just the imperative -- a casual (possibly not very heart-felt invitation).
I shan't be gone long. -- You come too.
About the meter...what can I say? How would this weather on Metrical III?
Well, I don't know how it would do on Metrical III. But from my perspective it's not far from regular:
i SHANT be GONE long YOU come TOO -- is the underlying pattern -- I'd assume that speaker emphasizes 'you' and 'too'. It's true that "LONG is more strongly accented than "GONE", but as I understand it this isn't really relevant -- assuming the very plausible emphasis on 'you', "you" has even more emphasis than "long" -- WITHIN EACH FOOT, the 1st syllable is relatively less stressed than the second syllable. Here Frost is avoiding the singsongyness you accused him of earlier.
I invite response— and expect to get lynched. This has taken longer than it takes to fetch a calf. Duh...you come too!
I won't lynch you -- why shouldn't you confess? (especially if it stirs up discussion). But you haven't yet persuaded me even about this poem, and I wonder what you make of "Death of the Hired Man" (esp. lines 95-120) or "Home Burial". I'll confess to admiring Frost -- though I don't aim to write like him.
[This message has been edited by ChrisW (edited April 20, 2001).]
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