Metrical anomalies

[Caleb Murdock]

I hear a good deal of laying-down of rules, but you asked for opinion, and you have it. For some reason, I find your posts uncomfortable; it may be me. But what seems to happen, is that you end up quoting yourself. Surely, if you have a general problem, it would be better to express it in general terms, and if examples are useful, find them in the poems of well-known writers, or people posting here. Then when your problem is resolved in general, you can apply what you have learnt to your own work.

You put up something with an anapaest among the iambs. Milo told you he didn't think this a good trick. You then mysteriously laid your hand on exactly the same stuff, from Frost. You seem satisfied with the answers to your own questions. But it may just be me, of course. No need to reply.

I am a bit of a know-it-all, and I'm aware of that, and I'm also aware that it makes people uncomfortable. But I'm certainly not the only know-it-all on this forum. I have a tendency to push the envelope, and that also makes people uncomfortable.

There are lots of aspects of poetry where I have uncertainties, but I don't have uncertainties in the area of scansion and meter. I understand those things quite well. I'm not going to pretend not to know what I know. So when I come on a forum where someone says "you can't put a three-syllable foot in a line of iambic poetry", and I know that that is ridiculous, I'm going to say so.

As I said somewhere else, I use my own poems as examples because I'm more interested in my own poetry than anyone else's -- and a forum like this is the place to display one's poetry. Also, it takes quite a bit of time to read poem after poem of other people's work in order to find examples -- especially when there are examples from my own work that I'm already familiar with.

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Once again, you may want to find a comfortable time to stop speaking and start listening as you have no clue what you are talking about and it is unlikely you will learn if you dont pay attention.

Milo, stop talking down to me. I'm not here to learn things I already know.

NOW: I gave an example in my first post which represents an area where I feel some uncertainty -- and I'm talking about that fifth line that seems to go to six syllables. Why don't you address what I said there instead of playing this one-upmanship.