Carol, in accentual syllabic dimeter, every line would have four syllables, as in my lttle poem To A Trout:
I whet my hook
beneath a pine.
Then with a swish
I loft my line
over a brook
of sparkling wine.
Come, little fish,
and we will dine.
In the first-mentioned poems above syllable counts vary from as few as three (Fog-festooned) to as many as six (Of a day I had rued.) However there are two stresses per line, so they're all clearly accentual. Of course I agree with you and disagree with Frost. There are dactylic, anapestic, and trochaic meters. I would even argue that if you scan Swinburne (or Murphy), it's possible to concede that there is amphibrachic meter in English.
Nonetheless, the vast majority of The Canon is strict accentual syllabic verse, and I think this impoverishes our metrics. One of the things I love about Alicia is her use of hypermetric lines. Alicia, could you post your bat sonnet for us again? It's a poem where the metrical liberties are marvelously expressive of the subject. This evening I'll type in some hypermetric trimeters and tetrameters from Frost.
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