Today, I sat me down to ponder <br />Why I write like this: <br />Four metric feet, first line of text, <br />And three feet in the next. <br />This sing-song meter ambles on <br />From line to line, and then, <br />A rhyme is put, delightfully, <br />To have the stanza end. <br /> <br />From where the rhythm and the style? <br />From where I caught the rhyme? <br />I thought back to my schooling days, <br />And poem-reading time. <br /> <br />Ancient Mariner is one <br />That I remember well: <br />Its rhyme and rhythm still come through, <br />As clearly as a bell: <br /> <br />Then, Shakespeare and the other greats, <br />Who wrote iambic lines, <br />Influenced me so subtly, <br />Their style, my pen defines. <br /> <br />'America the Beautiful' <br />Has meter, style, and grace; <br />And most of us are wondered by <br />Its thoughtful, moving pace. <br />This four-feet, three-feet meter fits <br />So well in verse or song, <br />We memorize it easily <br />And sense it when it's wrong. <br /> <br />It's this bound verse that captured me, <br />Poetic pen and all: <br />It's why I write iambic lines, <br />And have myself a ball. <br /> <br />This iambic tetrameter, <br />Trimeter in line two: <br />I write it for the pleasure <br />And enjoyment given you,,,, <br /> And me!<br /><br />Frank V. Gardner<br /><br />http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/iambic-tetrameter-and-me/
