RHYME AND METER


Verse now may wander infinitely free,
Released from measure’s strictures and thus be
Unbound from expectations both in sound
And form, more able then to be profound;
Or so the theory goes, but I demur,
And all my fellow formalists concur,
We who maintain the venerable skills
Of antique musicality that thrills
The senses and compels the mind to seek
A perfect phrasing, fitting and unique.
For meter is the pump that makes lines flow,
And rhyme’s what tells a line just where to go.

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