Thinking Allowed

Ah Love!

the aneurism that caused

my skull to swell, my soul to burst

a mess only the finest cleansers purged

~spacial note~

Please cleanse your digits before continuing to write. Thank you.          The management.

One aspect of writing in form at which I'm particularly hopeless is enjambment - part of the exercise here.

Most of the free verse I read seems to adopt the 'arbitrary line break' approach, where the appearance of breaks bears no relation to either whatever rhythm may be present or the semantic content.  Perhaps that's the principal problem - metre/rhythm is seen (and heard?) as an obstacle in free verse, the primary objective being to write stuff as it would be delivered in casual speech rather than as the writer intends it to be read (as poetry). Free verse as casual prose, chopped up into pieces, thrown into the air; replete with lines and stanzas wherever they land.

Perhaps that's why, to my ignorant eye and ear, enjambment presented itself as an unnatural practice, reminiscent of the lack of construction & discipline in free verse. I guess I've come to appreciate that it's actually the opposite - a device that allows the substance of a poem to be presented and expressed in a more natural fashion, within the metrical framework of a form.

In some instances, form poetry that comprises self-contained lines and stanzas can be tediously stilted and soporific, especially in conjunction with a rhyming pattern and perfect feet throughout. Hmm...nursery rhymes - another hole in the heart of my childhood :>

Incidentally, I wondered about L9. In terms of pentameter, I presume that's iamb/pyrrhus/iamb/pyrrhus/iamb. In the context of the line, and after a brief sojourn in the realm of online metrical resources, could it be scanned as secondus paeon/secondus paeon/iamb? Is that a) a variation too far, or b) utter bollocks?

hmm.  I enjoyed the sonnet, and that's all I'm going to say. Because my poor head is too exhausted to make any kind of an intelligent critique. But your thoughts on line breaks certainly grabbed my attention. Particularly in the context of form poetry.  Trying to make effective use of line breaks in a sonnet is probably the best way to develop them as good tools in free verse. Because it is more difficult in a sonnet. And line breaks are EXCELLENT tools. Even if some poets don't appreciate them as such.  Think of line breaks as the lead guitar jamming with the rhythm guitar of the grammatical structure.  There's a sort of rhythmic interplay between the two that give a poet yet another structural element to add depth to a poem. At least that's how I see it.

Of course, I'm still ignoring a critique of your poem, even one that focuses on line breaks in an iambic form.  But I never even bothered to count your feet.  Or see if there were any.  Sigh.  I'm tired and its only morning.

you see, that's why its so interesting to make strategic use of breaks and enjambment in sonnets - the breaks are preordained, so you accentuate them with the grammar/sentence structure running through the breaks for a couple of feet - not hogwild, but selectively and strategically.  in free verse its  more of the reverse. In both cases, though, sound dictates the limit of what's acceptable.  At least in my book.