Odd-Syllable Poetry

[Anonymous No.21500464]

I have noticed that the vast majority of poetry written in English has a base verse with an even number of syllables. The base verse of iambic pentameter has ten syllables. Fourteener, as its name suggests, has a base of fourteen syllables. The Alexandrine has twelve syllables.

What I'm wondering is, is there any tradition in English of a base line with an odd number of syllables? Poetic meters that have nine-syllable lines, for example, or 11 or 13 syllables? There doesn't seem to be, but I may just be looking in the wrong places.

[Anonymous No.21500544]

Well the iamb is the dominant form of English prosody. In Latin you still have various dactyl's and other such trisyllables, but in English you are kinda stuck in 2x mode, even when trying to write in quantitative meter's. Blank and free verse showtimes get away from it.
When i tried writing some trisyllable poetry i used Auden's O Where Are You Going as a blueprint. Although it's it's not exactly perfect about it.


"O where are you going?" said reader to rider,
"That valley is fatal where furnaces burn,
Yonder's the midden whose odours will madden,
That gap is the grave where the tall return."

"O do you imagine," said fearer to farer,
"That dusk will delay on your path to the pass,
Your diligent looking discover the lacking,
Your footsteps feel from granite to grass?"

"O what was that bird," said horror to hearer,
"Did you see that shape in the twisted trees?
Behind you swiftly the figure comes softly,
The spot on your skin is a shocking disease."

"Out of this house"---said rider to reader,
"Yours never will"---said farer to fearer
"They're looking for you"---said hearer to horror,
As he left them there, as he left them there.

[Anonymous No.21501303]

>>21500544
Dr. Seuss did it better

[Anonymous No.21503014]

>>21500544
I feel like there's some trisyllable poetry in English. A Visit From Saint Nicholas is the first example that comes to mind, though I'm sure there are some other more serious ones.

[Anonymous No.21503031]

>>21503014
I know Browning has some but im too lazy to look.
Also some Homer translations try to keep up the mock Greek feel.

[Anonymous No.21503047]

>>21500464
Eenie, meanie, miney, mo

[Anonymous No.21503052]

>>21500544
Blake has odd syllables

[Anonymous No.21503067]

>>21500464
Blake sometimes used odd syllables
>Tyger Tyger, burning bright,
>In the forests of the night;
>What immortal hand or eye,
>Could frame thy fearful symmetry?

[Anonymous No.21503875]

>>21500464
Just search for catalectic poems. Poe uses them. I've used them myself. For whatever reason, iambic is the most natural meter in english, so that's why it's usually even numbered lines, because it sounds most natural to the english ear. But if you want to make something off-putting, unsettling, you can use catalectic lines to enhance the effect.