FORM AND FUNCTION

I’ve grown in time addicted to this line
That trips across the page iambically,
Which, coupled with a rhyme, shapes a design
Where function follows form mysteriously.

For what I find to say depends upon
Contingencies of meter and of sound;
These elements from which my thoughts are drawn
Come first, and not the other way around.

There’s no way I can know before I write
And watch thought grow with every line that comes
What I might find of insight and delight
While rhymes plumb unseen depths and meter strums.

Then as the scheme demands, a couplet ends
This formal frame on which my mind depends.

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