View First Unread. Nyctom brought up one of my favorite topics under a General Discussion thread--heterometric poetry. If this has been featured here before, apologies. I'm off to the States for a couple weeks, and will peep in when I can, but thought I'd leave you all with something to discuss. Heterometric poetry may be metric poetry of different line lengths, or, more rarely perhaps, lines of different feet.
Organic, musical, surprising, it can range from the sublime Wordsworth's "Intimations" ode to endearing doggerel Ogden Nash. And frankly, it is something we see too little of, at least too little skilled examples of, in the ranks of New Formalism.
Here are a few examples. Though distinctly "hetero", this first is also grounded in the iambic. I am probably biased against "ars poetica" poems, but this has a delightful wit to it--I think it even gets away with the slightly pat closing phrase--which goes back, slyly, to "meaning" rather than "being" : Ars Poetica by Archibald MacLeish A poem should be palpable and mute As a globed fruit, Dumb As old medallions to the thumb, Silent as the sleeve-worn stone Of casement ledges where the moss has grown-- A poem should be worldless As the flight of birds.
For all the history of grief An empty doorway and a maple leaf. For love The leaning grasses and two lights above the sea-- A poem should not mean But be. Stallings's homepage! Find all posts by A.
Not to say that there are NOT some fine examples among contemporary writers, perhaps especially among the younger generation. This is a delightful and deceptively "effortless" looking piece by Catherine Tufariello whose chapbooks are available from Aralia press , a playful poem that is, both in form and in subject, about "Free Time". And there are all kinds of nice juxtapositions between rules and freedom here--"regulation" height, the "rules and hammers" of the janitor, etc.
