A Matter of Meter
By David L. Harrison

That's not free verse, right? It's that "other" kind of poetry – verse. You can tell because "The Chigger" demonstrates four characteristics of verse: meter, rhyme, structured lines and a specific number of accented syllables per line. To be technical, the meter is trochaic (stress falling on the first syllable of alternating syllables); the rhyme is an end rhyme (similar or identical sounds on the final word or syllable of each line); the line length is tetrameter (four beats per line); and together the lines form a couplet (a poetic stanza consisting of two lines, often rhymed).

How much of that technical information do your students need to write their own couplets? None. Terminology can come later. First comes modeling, then the fun of making up a poem. Why should we encourage students to experiment with verse? Writing verse is a learning experience. Arranging words, sounds and syllables can turn everyday language into metered language (language that can be measured), and metered language is the definition of verse. Verse usually rhymes, but it doesn't have to.

This couplet rhymes:

This couplet does not rhyme:

Both couplets convey a complete thought in metered language, so they qualify as verse.

Establishing a pattern. Meter helps students establish sets of syllables and lines that can be counted. It offers them a template for composing their poems. Most children start school with the basic tools they need to write verse: They think in complete thoughts (sentences) and know how words sound when they are pronounced. English is a language of stressed and unstressed syllables. Young poets intuitively understand rhythm and can duplicate patterns.

A good way for students to move quickly into writing verse is to choose a favorite poem and pattern their own poem using the same meter. Some students may begin at once by making up their own pattern.

In third grader Emmie's poem, she establishes a pattern of three beats per line and ends each line with the same sound. Her poem is really four sets of couplets, each concluding with the same phrase: "Because she is so fat."

Mac, a fifth grader, patterns his poem after a limerick.

Lucy, a sixth grader, doesn't know she's composing a ballad stanza (three beats in lines 1, 2, and 4; four beats in line 3; lines 2 and 4 rhyme). She's just having fun describing her cat.

With emphasis. Creating poetic feet (sets of syllables, one of which is accented) frequently requires using all or part of one word followed by all or part of the next. Sometimes this process affects where we place the emphasis. We might say in casual conversation, "My cat looks like a mat." But when Emmie sets those words into verse, the structure of her poem suggests that we accent every other syllable. We normally don't emphasize the word like, but the way it's placed here encourages us to stress the word a little more than usual. Emmie knows what feels right in her poem even though she can't explain it.

She also demonstrates a teaching opportunity. In music, the same notes in different combinations produce jazz, Dixieland, blues, marches and symphonic works. In poetry, the same words in different combinations produce a marvelous variety of verse. Students learn that how they arrange their words influences how their lines flow. There is no such thing as one true Standard English, and writing patterns reflect speech patterns. Poetry, more than any other genre, reflects the rich diversity of our people.

Read a poem while your students tap out the accented and unaccented syllables. "The Centipede" has a regular meter. Every other syllable is stressed.

Ask your students to help you search for poems with other meter patterns. Creating a collection of meters for their poetry folders pulls them into the beating rhythms of verse and reinforces how they pattern their own poems. It also directs your students' attention to the place where all verse begins: meter.

Time for rhyme. I saved rhyme for last. Rhyme is less forgiving than meter. Sometimes students focus so hard on finding words that sound alike that they stretch logic and skip over meter entirely. Once students feel the beat, rhyming choices become clearer. If they come to a spot where they can't find a suitable rhyme, do what poets do – try a different line with the same meter.

Finally – and most importantly – keep it light. Not all students are equally adept with meter and rhyme. Not all students are equal in math or swimming either. But making up verse is a fun word game when we present it that way. Not all soufflés turn out picture perfect, but there's something yummy in each one. Here's to your students' delicious verse!

David L. Harrison, who lives in Springfield, MO, is poet laureate of Drury University. "The Chigger" and "The Centipede" will appear in his upcoming collection, Small Matters!

April 2006, Vol.36, No.7