Rhythm in Poetry

The challenge with rhythmic poetry is that no matter how good it is, it's invariably not READ in rhythm. This can often be witnessed by watching a poet perform his/her work, buying their book and reading it. Invariably one can't get the same feel to reading a stranger's work than they can in performing it.

well I yes and no its the way you feel at the time I think.

Everybody has their own method justified or not by the end result. I mix imagery, rhythm and yes, rhyme. Rhythms often grow as I write and can become the glue that holds the whole thing together. By no means the only or "right" way - just the way I go about it.

I go by the feel of it. I actually wrote a poem ABOUT the matter of writing poetry without clinical awareness of rhythm, called 'Performing in the Absence of Light' in which I compare the process to painting in the dark, working by the feel of the brush on the canvas.

I just let it flow...what it looks and sounds like afterwards is usually a total surprise to me. I find that I usually tend to fall into some kind of rhythm pattern without intending to though.

"The ghost of some simple metre Should lurk behind the arras in even the 'freest' verse; To advance menacingly as we doze and withdraw as we rouse Or, freedom is only freedom When it appears against the background Of an artificial limitation." 'Elucidating Eliot' by me

*applauds*

At the same time, some pieces seem to shock with the surprise both of the underlying rhythm, as well as the seeming ease with which that rhythm sit in the poetry: thus for me much of Seamus Heaney's writing, especially pieces found in "The Spirit Level" and "Electric Light" take on a new life when read, or better still heard. Again, Heaney makes use of silence and pauses, as does his erstwhile contemporary Ted Hughes. I tried to write poems with a set pattern of stresses built into the words, recurring, but irregular in terms of each line's relationship. More than rhyme, which is an easier, and I think less musical process, rhythm is hard to achieve in an effective manner. Dum-dee-dum-dee-dum-dee-dum is an all too easy trap into which to fall. I was never able successfully to resolve the tension between needing to create a pattern within the poetry, and avoiding a facile (or pointless, therefore irrelevant) beat within a piece. One way around this is to bend your rules, add an extra syllable if it fits, reverse weak-strong patterns, create an organized disorder within the poem. Or, of course, truly free verse is always an option, but, again, difficult to pull off successfully, and too easy to sound pretentious, without really saying anything. Just like this.