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I find that metre enhances good lines to make them great, at best, & dooms the bad to insufferability. KS On 16/01/2008, Janet Jackson <[log in to unmask]> wrote: > I'm reading Stephen Fry's "The Ode Less Travelled", which is poetry writing > for, not dummies, but smart people who want to learn about prosody. If you > already know about prosody it's still a fun read and Fry's illustrative > examples (from Chaucer to MC Hammer!) are good. And I'm doing the exercises, > distasteful though some of them are (dactylic hexameter about cows! > Tetrameter about television!). Anyway today's exercise was to imagine > oneself as a Victorian poet and write a rhyming poem to commemorate the Tay > bridge disaster (girders collapse, train goes down in a howling storm) that > was the subject of a truly dreadful poem by William (William?) McGonagall. I > thought the results were interesting: > > Were they dozing in their seats? > Did they shiver at the gale? > Were children snuggled up on mothers laps > Not dreaming that the new bridge would collapse, > That Britain's hopes could fail, > Flung screaming down to die? > > Did anybody lie > For saving face or greed > Or were that seventy-five, in howling terror, > Done in by plain bad luck and human error? > An iron horse can't bleed. > A bridge, when sick, won't grumble > > Refuse to eat, or stumble > Or quail at sleet and thunder, > Or show us where her buttresses are missing > Until, with shrieking wheels and steampipes hissing > A heavy train goes under. > Were we dozing in our seats? > > Hardly my usual mode, is it? > (If this were more than an exercise I wouldn't be happy with it -- in > particular, the order of the ideas -- but I can't be bothered to do any more > with it.) > > I wouldn't say it's more difficult to write well in this manner than in > unrhymed or free verse. The challenges are different, that's all. But it is > a mode that really lends itself to writing badly! > > Janet > -- > Janet Jackson > [log in to unmask] > www.proximity.webhop.net > www.myspace.com/poetjj >