18 PROSODY: SOUND, RHYTHM, AND RHYME IN POETRY

Prosody refers to the study of sounds and rhythms in poetry. Poets, attuned to language, select words
not just for content but also for sound, and arrange words so that important ideas and climaxes of
sound coincide. Some
people think of rhythm and sound as the music of poetry, since it refers to measured sounds much like
rhythms and tempos in music. Also like music, poetry requires some regularity of beat, but the tempo
and loudness may be freer and less regular, and a reader may linger over certain sounds and words,
depending on their position in a line.

Prosody
Prosody is the word most often used in reference to sound and rhythm, but other descriptive words are
metrics, versification, and mechanics of verse,

THINGS TO CONSIDER IN STUDYING PROSODY

To consider prosody you will need a few basic linguistic facts. Words are made up of individually
meaningful sounds (segmental phonemes), which here we will call simply segments. Thus, in the word
top there are three segments: t, o, and p. When you hear these three sounds in order, you recognize the
sounds as the word “top.” It takes three alphabetical letters—t , o, and p—to spell (graph) “top,”,
because each letter is identical with a segment. Sometimes it takes more than one letter to spell a
segment. In the word enough, for example, there are four segments (e, n, u,f) but six letters: e, n, ou, and
gh. The last two segments (u and/) require two letters each (two letters forming one segment are called
a digraph). In the word through there are three segments but seven letters. To be correctly spelled in
this word, the do segment must have four letters (ough). Note, however, that in the word flute the do
segment requires only one letter, u.
Individual sounds in combination make up words, and separate words in combination make up lines
of poetry. When we study
the combined flow of words, we are concerned with rhythm, and when we study the effect of various
segments in relationship to the rhythms and the content, we are concerned with sound, more
specifically alliteration, assonance, and rhyme.
It is important to emphasize that prosody should never be separated from the content of a poem.
Prosody is significant only as it supports and underscores content. Alexander Pope wrote that “the
sound [of poetry] must seem an echo to the sense.” In short, words count, and not only for their
meanings, but also for their sounds and their contributions to a rhythmical flow. Thus, the study of
prosody is an attempt to determine how poets have arranged the words of their poems to make sound
complement content.

DISTINGUISHING SOUNDS FROM SPELLING

In the study of prosody, it is essential to distinguish between spelling, or graphics, and pronunciation,
or phonetics. Not all English sounds are spelled and pronounced in the same way. Thus the letter s has
three very different sounds in the words sweet, sugar, and flows: s, sh and z. On the other hand, the
words shape, ocean, nation, sure, and machine use different letters or combinations of letters (as digraphs)
to spell the same sh sound.
Vowel sounds also vary in spelling and pronunciation. For example, the e sound (as the alphabet
letter) can be spelled i in machine, ee in speed, ea in eat, e in even, and y in funny, yet the vowel sounds in
eat, break, and bear are not the same although they are spelled the same. Remember this: With both
consonants and vowel sounds, do not confuse spellings with sounds.

RHYTHM IN POETRY AND PROSE

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Rhythm in speech is a combination of vocal speeds, rises and falls, starts and stops, vigor and
slackness, and relaxation and tension. Every spoken utterance is rhythmical to some extent, but in
ordinary speech and in the reading of prose, rhythm is usually less important than the flow of ideas.
Rhythm is more significant in poetry, however, because poetry is so emotionally charged, compact, and
intense. So poets habitually devote great attention and skill to the sounds and rhythms of language.
Poets invite readers to stop at words, to dwell upon sounds, to slow down at times, and to speed up
others. As language becomes more dramatic and intense, it also becomes more rhythmical. Therefore
when you read poetry—and the best way is to read it aloud—you will give great attention to
individual words; your unit of expression will be shorter than in prose; your voice will go through a
wider range of pitch; and you can rely on greater ranges of dramatic poetry.
The unit of rhythm in poetry and prose is the syllable, which consists of a single strand of sound
such as a in “a table,” fine in “fine linen,“ sleds in “new sleds,” and flounce in “the little girls flounce into
the room.” (While “a” is a syllable of only one segment, “flounce” consists of six segments: f, l, ow, n, t,
and s). The rhythm of English poetry in the closed form is determined by the measured relationship of
heavily stressed to less heavily stressed syllables. In pronouncing words and phrases, you give some
syllables more force and intensity than others (note the comparative intensities of the syllables as you
say, for example, “the bucket“ or “the old oaken bucket”). In analyzing prosody, we say that the more
intense syllables are given heavy stress, while the relatively less intense syllables are given light stress. In
closed form verse, poets regularize the syllables into patterns called feet, which normally consist of one
heavily stressed syllable and one or more lightly stressed syllables.
There are various types of metrical feet, each with a definite pattern. A metrical foot, the basic
building block of poetry, is the pattern of one stressed syllable and one or more lightly stressed
syllables in a line. Poets of traditional or closed forms usually fill their lines with a specific number of
the same feet, and that number determines the meter, or measure of that line. Thus five feet in a line are
pentameter, four are tetrameter, three are trimeter, and two are dimeter. To these may be added the
less common line lengths hexameter, a six-foot line, heptameter or the septenary, seven feet, and
octameter, eight feet. In terms of accent or beat, a trimeter line has three beats (or heavy stresses), a
pentameter line five beats, and so on.
Frequently, rhetorical needs cause poets to substitute other feet for the regular foot established in
the poem. Whether there is substitution or not, however, the number and kind of feet in each line
constitute the metrical description of that line. To discover the prevailing metrical system in any poem,
you scan the poem. The act of scanning is called scansion.

METRICAL FEET
Equipped with this knowledge, you are ready to scan poems in order to determine their rhythmical
patterns. The most important metrical feet may be generally classed as the two-syllable foot, the three
syllable foot, and the imperfect (or one-syllable) foot.
THE TWO-SYLLABLE FOOT
1. IAMB. The iambic foot consists of a light stress followed by a heavy stress:
– ~
/ the WINDS /
The iamb is the most common foot in English poetry because it most nearly reflects natural speech. It is
the most versatile of poetic feet, capable of great variation. Even within the same line, iambic feet may
vary in intensity, so that they may support or undergrid the shades of meaning designed by the poet.
Such variability, approximating the stresses and rhythms of actual speech, makes the iamb suitable for
both serious or light verse, and it therefore assists poets in focusing attention on ideas and emotions. If
they use it with skill, it never becomes monotonous, for it does not distract readers by drawing
attention to its own rhythm.

2. TROCHEE. A heavy stress followed by a light stress:

~ –
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 / FLOW- er /
Most English words are characteristically trochaic, for example:

~ – ~ – ~ – ~ – ~ – ~ – ~ –
WAter, SNOWfall, AUthor, WILlow, MORning, EARly, FOLlow.
~ – ~ –
SINGing, SOMEthing

Because trochaic rhythm has often been called falling, dying, light or anticlimactic, while iambic rhythm is
rising, elevating, serious, or climatic, poets have preferred the iambic foot. They therefore have arranged
various placements of two-syllable words, using single-syllable words and a variety of other means,
so that the stressed syllable is at the end of the foot, as in Shakespeare’s
– ~ – ~ – ~ – ~
his BEND - / ing SICK - / le's COM - / pass COME /
in which three successive trochaic words are arranged to match the iambic meter.

3. SPONDEE. Two successive, equally heavy stresses, as in men's eyes in Shakespeare's line:

~ – – ~ – ~ – ~ ~ ~
WHEN, in / dis -GRACE / with FOR - / tune AND / MEN'S EYES.

The spondee — sometimes called a hovering accent — is mainly a substitute foot in English verse,
because at a certain point successive spondees would more properly develop as iambs or trochees. For
this reason it is virtually impossible, within traditional metrical patterns, for an entire poem to be
written in spondees. As an occasional substitute foot, however, the spondee creates emphasis.

4. PYRRHIC. Two unstressed syllables (even though one of them may be in a normally stressed position),
as in on their in Pope's line:

– ~ – ~ – – ~ ~ – ~
Now SLEEP - / ing FLOCKS / on their / SOFT FLEEC - / es LIE.
The pyrrhic consists of weakly accented words such as prepositions and articles. Like the spondee, it is
usually substituted for an iamb or trochee, and therefore a complete poem cannot be in pyrrhics. As a
substitute foot, however, the pyrrhic acts as a kind of rhythmic catapult to move the reader swiftly to
the next strongly accented syllable, and therefore it undergirds the ideas conveyed by more important
words.

THE THREE-SYLLABLE FOOT

1. ANAPAEST. Two light stresses followed by a heavy:
– – ~ – – ~
by the DAWN'S / ear - ly LIGHT.

2 DACTYL. A heavy stress followed by two lights (as in the first two feet in this line):
~ – – ~ – – ~ –
THIS is the / FOR - est pri - / ME - val.

THE IMPERFECT FOOT

The imperfect foot consists of a single syllable: (~) by itself, or (–) by itself. This foot is a variant or
substitute occurring in a poem in which one of the major feet forms the metrical pattern. The second

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line of “The Star-Spangled Banner,” for example, is anapaestic, but it contains an imperfect foot at the
end:

What so PROUD - / ly we Hailed / at the TWI - / light's last GLEAM - / ing.

UNCOMMON METERS
In many poems you might encounter variants other than those described above. Poets like Browning,
Tennyson, Poe, and Swinburne experimented with uncommon meters. Other poets manipulated
pauses or caesurae (discussed below) to create the effects of uncommon meters. For these reasons, you
might need to refer to metrical feet such as the following:

1. AMPHIBRACH. A light, heavy, light pattern:

Ah FEED me / and FILL me / with PLEAS - sure (Swinburne).
2. AMPHIMACER or CRETIC. A heavy, light, heavy pattern:
LOVE is BEST (Browning).

3 BACCHIUS or BACCHIC. A light stress followed by two heavy stresses, as in “Some late lark”:
SOME late lark / SING - ing (Henley).

4. DIPODIC MEASURE. Dipodic measure (literally, “two feet” combining to make one) develops in longer
lines when a poet submerges two regular feet under a stronger beat, so that a galloping or rollicking
rhythm results. The following line from Browning's “A Toccata of Galuppi's,” for example, may be
scanned as trochaic heptameter, with the last foot being an amphimacer:

DID young / PEO - ple / TAKE their / PLEAS - ure / WHEN the / SEA was / WARM in May?

In recitation, however, a stronger beat is superimposed, which makes one foot out of two, resulting in
dipodic measure:

DID young PEOple / TAKE their PLEASure / WHEN the SEA / was warm in MAY?

5. ACCENTUAL, STRONG and “SPRUNG” rhythms. Accentual or strong-stress lines are historically derived
from Old English poetry, in which each line was divided in two, with two major stresses occurring in
each half. In the nineteenth century, Gerard Manley Hopkins developed what he called “sprung”
rhythm, in which the major stresses are released or “sprung” from the line. The method is too complex
to describe, but one characteristic is the juxtaposing of one-syllable stressed words, as in this line from
his poem “Pied Beauty.” To scan it you must be sure to pause longer at the semicolons than at the
commas.

With SWIFT, SLOW; SWEET, sour; a DAZZLE, DIM;

Here a number of elements combine to create six major stresses in the line, which contains only nine
syllables. Many of Hopkins's lines combine alliteration and strong stresses in this way to create the
same effect of heavy emphasis.
A parallel instance of strongly stressed lines may be seen in “We Real Cool” by Gwendolyn
Brooks. In this poem the effect is achieved by the exclusive use of monosyllabic stressed words
combined with internal rhyme, repetition, and alliteration.

THE CAESURA OR PAUSE

Whenever we speak, we utter a number of syllables without pause of any sort, and stop only after a
definite group of meaningful words is finished. These groups of words, rhythmically, are cadence
groups. In poetry, the short or heavy pause separating cadence groups is called a caesura (plural
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caesurae). For scansion, the caesura may be marked by two diagonal lines or virgules (//)to
distinguishes it from the single virgule separating feet. Sometimes the caesura coincides with the end of
a foot, as in this line by William Blake (“To Mrs. Anna Flaxman”):

With HANDS /di- VINE / / he MOV'D/the GEN-/tie SOD./

The caesura, however, may fall within a foot, and there may be more than one in a line, as in this line
by Ben Jonson (“Penshurst”):

Thou ART / NOT, / / PENS - / hurst, / / BUILT / to EN - / vious SHOW. /

When a caesura ends a line, usually marked by a comma, semicolon, or period, that line end-stopped,
as in this line which opens Keats's “Endymion”:

A THING / of BEAU - / ty / / IS / a JOY / for - EV -er. / /

if line has no punctuation at the end and runs over to the next line, it is called run-on. A term also used
to indicate run-on lines is enjambment (French for “spanning” or “straddling”). The following passage,
a continuation of the preceding line from Keats, contains three run-on lines:

Us loveliness increases; //it will never

Pass into nothingness; / / but still will keep
A bower quiet for us, / / and a sleep
Full of sweet dreams,//. . .

SEGMENTAL POETIC DEVICES

Once you have completed your analysis of rhythms, you may go on to consider the segmental poetic
devices in the poem. Usually these devices are used to create emphasis, but sometimes in context they
may echo or imitate some of the things being described. The segmental devices most common in poetry
are assonance, alliteration, and onomatopoeia.

ASSONANCE. The repetition of identical vowel sounds in different words-for example, the short f in
“swift Camilla slams”— is called assonance. It is a strong means of emphasis, as in the following line,
where the ū sound connects the two words lull and slumber, and the short ī connects him, in, and his:

And more, to lull him in his slumber soft.

In some cases, poets may use assonance elaborately, as in the first line of Pope’s An Essay on criticism:

‘Tis hard to say, if greater want of skill.

Here the line is framed and balanced with the short ī in ‘Tis, if and skill, the short ä in hard and want,
and the aiid the ã in m say and greater.

ALLITERATION. Like assonance, alliteration is a means of highlighting ideas by the selection of words
containing the same consonant sound — example, the repeated m in Spenser's “Mixed with a
murmuring wind,” or the s sound in Waller's “Your never-failing sword made war to cease,” which
emphasizes the connection between the words “sword” and “cease.”
There are two kinds of alliteration. (1) Most commonly, alliteration is regarded as the repetition of
identical consonant sounds that begin syllables in close patterns — for example, in Pope's lines
“Laborious, heavy, busy, bold, and blind,” and “While pensive poets painful vigils keep.” Used judi-
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ciously, alliteration gives strength to ideas by emphasizing key words, but too much can cause comic
and catastrophic consequences. (2) Another form of alliteration occurs when a poet repeats identical or
similar consonant sounds that do not begin syllables but nevertheless create a pattern — for example,
the z segment in the line “In these places freezing breezes easily cause sneezes,” or the b, m, and p
segments (all of which are made bilabially; that is, with both lips) in “The mumbling and murmuring
beggar throws pegs pebbles in the bubb1ing pool.” Such patterns, apparently deliberately organized, are
hard to overlook.

ONOMATOPOEIA. Onomatopoeia is a blending of consonant and vowel sounds designed to imitate or

suggest a situation or action. It is made possible in poetry because many words in English are echoic in
origin; that is, they are verbal echoes of the actions they describe, such as buzz, bump, slap, spirit, and so
on. Edgar Allan Poe used such words to create onomatopoeia in “The Bells“ where through the
combined use of assonance and alliteration he imitates the kinds of bells he celebrates. Thus, wedding
bells sound softly with “molten golden notes” (õ), while alarm bells “clang and clash and roar” (kl).
David Wagoner includes imitative words like twiddledy trump and wheeze to suggest the sounds of the
music produced by the protagonist of his “March for a One-Man Band.”

RHYME AND ITS FUNCTIONS

Rhyme is the repetition of identical or similar concluding syllables in different words, most often at the
ends of lines. Words with the same concluding vowel sounds rhyme; such rhymes are a special kind of
assonance. Thus day rhymes with weigh, grey, bouquet, and matinee. Rhyme may also combine assonance
and identical consonant sounds, as in ache, bake, break, and opaque, or turn, yearn, fern, and adjourn. As
these examples illustrate, rhyme is predominantly a function of sound rather than spelling; the words do
not have to be spelled the same way or look alike to rhyme.
Rhyme is not a universal feature of poetry; thousands of excellent poems have been written
without any recourse to rhyming whatsoever. Indeed, many contemporary poets have abandoned
rhyme completely in favor of other ways of joining sound and sense because they find rhyme too
restrictive or artificial. Nevertheless, rhyme has been an important aspect of poetry for hundreds of
years, and it remains a valid and useful poetic technique today.

TYPES OF RHYMES
The effects of rhyme are closely connected with those of rhythm and meter. Rhymes that are produced
with one-syllable words—like moon, June, tune, and soon—or with multisyllabic words in which the
accent falls on the last syllable—like combine, decline, refine, consign and repine—are called heavy stress
rhyme, accented rhyme, or rising rhyme. In general, rising rhyme lends itself to serious effects. The
accenting of heavy stress rhyme appears in the opening lines of Robert Frost's “Stopping by Woods on
a Snowy Evening”;

WHOSE WOODS / these ARE /i THINK /i KNOW

HIS HOUSE / is IN / the VIL - / lage THOUGH.
Here, the rhyme sounds are produced by one-syllable words—know and though- that occur in the final
accented positions of the lines (which are iambic tetrameter with initial spondees).
Rhymes using words of two or more syllables in which the accent falls on any syllable other than
the last are called trochaic or double rhyme for rhymes of two syllables and dactylic or triple rhyme
for rhymes of three syllables. Less technically, these types of rhymes are also called falling or dying
rhymes; this is probably because the energy of pronunciation Drops away on the light accent or accents
following the heavy accent.

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 In general, double and triple rhymes lend themselves more readily to amusing or light poetry than
they do to serious verse. The accents of falling rhyme may be seen in lines 2 and 4 of the first stanza of
"Miniver Cheevy" by Edwin Arlington Robinson:
Miniver Cheevy, child of scorn,
Grew lean while he assailed the seasons;
He wept that he was ever born,
And he had reasons.
In this poem the effect of the double rhyme is humorous and thus helps to make Miniver Cheevy a
slightly ridiculous and pathetic figure. Occasionally, however, double rhyme can be used successfully in
a serious poem, as in Robert Herrick's "To the Virgins, to Make Much of Time":
Gather ye rosebuds while ye may,
Old time is still a-flying;
And this same flower that smiles today
Tomorrow will be dying.
A-flying and dying (our italics) are both double rhymes; indeed, falling rhymes are utilized in the second and
fourth lines of every stanza of this poem. Herrick's use of falling rhymes throughout this poem lightens
the tone a bit, but it does not modify the seriousness of the poem's idea at all.
Dactylic or triple rhyme is extremely rare and almost always humorous in effect. It may be seen in
these lines from Robert Browning's "The Pied Piper of Hamlin."
Small feet were pattering, wooden shoes clattering,
Little hands clapping and little tongues chattering.
And, like fowls in a farm-yard when barley is scattering,
Here, the words that end the lines, clattering, chattering, and scattering, are all instances of triple rhyme. The first
line also offers an example of internal rhyme, the presence of a rhyming word within a line of verse. In this
case, pattering rhymes with clattering and also maintains the triple rhyme pattern.
VARIANTS IN RHYME
A wide latitude of rhyming forms has traditionally been accepted in English. Perfect rhyming words,
where both the vowel and the consonant sounds rhyme, are called exact rhymes. Not all rhymes,
however, are exact. We often find in poetry words that almost rhyme; in most of these instances, the
vowel segments are different while the consonants are the same. This or could with solitude. Emily
Dickinson uses slant rhyme extensively in "To Hear an Oriole Sing"; in the second stanza of the poem
she rhymes Bird, unheard, and Crowd. Bird and unheard make up an exact rhyme, but the vowel and
consonant shift in Crowd produces a slant rhyme.
Another variant that shows up in poetry written in English is eye rhyme or sight rhyme. In these
instances, we find the pairing of words that look alike but do not sound alike. Thus, according to eye
rhyme, "I wind [a clock]" may be joined to "The North Wind" or bough may be rhymed with cough, dough,
enough, and tough. Ben Jonson's "To Celia" begins with a typical eye rhyme:
Come, my Celia, let us prove, While we can, the sports of love
Prove and love look as though they ought to rhyme, but when the lines are read aloud, we realize that
they do not. As in all other instances of eye rhyme, the spelling is more important than the sound.
RHYME SCHEMES
A rhyme scheme refers to the pattern of rhyming sounds in a given poem. To describe rhyme schemes,
alphabetical letters are used to indicate the rhyming sounds. Each repeated letter indicates a rhyme.
Therefore, lines ending with love and dove would be indicated as a a. Each new rhyming sound is

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signified by a new letter. Thus, lines ending with the words love, moon, dove, June, above, and croon would
be schematized as a b a b a b. To formulate a rhyme scheme or pattern, you should include the meter and
the number of feet in each line as well as the letters indicating rhymes. Here is such a formulation:
Iambic pentameter: a b a b, c dc d
This scheme shows that all the lines in the poem are iambic, with five feet in each. It also indicates that
the rhyming lines are 1 and 3, 2 and 4, 5, and 7, 6 and 8. Finally, it signifies that the poem is two
stanzas and eight lines in length. Should the number of feet in the lines of a specific poem vary, you
can show this fact by using a number in front of each letter:
Iambic 4a 3b 4a 3b
I his formulation shows that the poem (or stanza) under consideration alternates lines of iambic
tetrameter with iambic trimeter; it also signifies that lines 1 and 3 rhyme and 2 and 4 rhyme. The
absence of a rhyme sound is indicated by an x. Thus, you might find a rhyme scheme formulated like this:
Iambic: 4x 3a 4x 3a
Again, the stanza under consideration alternates iambic tetrameter with trimeter, and again the stanza
is four lines long. This time, however, only lines 2 and 4 rhyme; there is no end rhyme in lines 1 and 3.

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