Golias,
Are you familiar with Derek Attridge's scansion method? Perhaps we need a way of discussing rhythm; most visitors to the metrical boards already know how to bold the beats, or how to symbolize the beats & non-beats, in our discussions of meter.
In order to understand various rhythms--and, they are quite various--we'd need a way of discussing or delineating them which is distinct from our methods for discussing meter.
I agree with whoever above said that the two are often the same, or near enough the same--at least in the "strictest" meters displayed in poems posted at Erato. Tim's posted poetry is usually not so mono, and others have displayed quite a bit of facility in weaving different but complementary metrical and rhythmic structures.
For my part...I'm still sketchy about the definition of rhythm, which I think has been broadly defined in two ways above: 1) the organization of the speech stresses of a poem, which might or might not match up with the beats, and 2) the organization of mixed feet within a poem, as substitutions or for the creation of "loose" meters or near-accentual meters. Maybe this broad summation is as much from memory of other discussions as from what's been posted above...but in any case, to my way of thinking these two are not at all the same thing. Other factors that shape rhythm have been introduced, in this thread or elsewhere: alliteration, quantitative pronunciations, caesurae, polysyllabic vs. monosyllabic word choice, etc. Add these up, and I grow mucho confused--especially when the question turns toward how we might discuss via concrete delineations the shape of rhythmical structures.
Curtis.
[This message has been edited by Curtis Gale Weeks (edited January 04, 2003).]
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