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Form

in Poetry Discussion

The debate between free verse and verse forms is never-ending. How do you feel about forms? Do they work for you or do you feel they constrict your poetry? I’m taking a deeper dive into studying forms and reviewing prosody, both of which are invaluable in sharpening and honing my own toolbox and increasing my appreciation and respect for more traditional poetry and poets. I’m listening to the audiobook of “The Ode Less Travelled” and have begun Robert Hass’s “A Little Book On Form.” I’m finding doing the first exercise in “The Ode Less Travelled” on writing in iambic pentameter is good discipline for getting oneself to think in a more poetic sense. However, I think it causes you to begin to become more aware of language, the proliferating and endless forms and nuances of expression it can take, and the sheer vastness and depth of the art. Do you ever play around with caesuras and enjambment—how they affect line(s), stanzas, rhythms in silent and read-aloud meter, influence meaning, subtext, and form? It never hurts to review fundamentals, for those are the key to improving understanding, facility with language, technique, flexibility, and a clearer eye towards what one desires to achieve. Even in free verse, form is set up and adhered to; does complete anarchy make for something untenable, or does it lend its own rhythms in a different arc and cause the practitioner to learn something new to add to h/his toolbox? Please add a comment. I think this is a subject that has room for much growth, learning, identification, understanding, and enjoyment! I look forward to all thoughts and hope you feel as passionate about it as I do!

8 comments

Comments (8)

Adam Gary

Jun 30

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Haha maybe this subconsciously inspired the stream last night. I’ve just sat down to read this, but must have seen a notification for it when you originally posted it. I’m sorry!

Mark Keller

Jul 01

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Replying to

No worries!!!!!!!!! The conversation should be never-ending and spark vigorous and passionate debate! Nothing wrong with that! Also, if it inspires a topic for the stream, all the better! It all points to the same thing: dialogue to encourage and deepen understanding of each other, as poets, writers, and contributors to the eternal conversation!!!!!!!!!!!

Herb Hagell

Jun 29

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Form 'forces' the writer to work harder. Free verse flows like water across the page.

You need to put in some effort to write within the confines & rules of form.

Mark Keller

Jun 30

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Replying to

Yes, indeed! Interesting to think what must have been the thoughts up to and including the nineteenth century, with some poets of the twentieth still writing in form! Free verse was an unknown ghost that hadn’t even made an entrance! I wonder what it must have been like to be able to write in form, without giving it too much thought because, form, for them, was free verse!

Adam Gary

Jun 30

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Replying to

Poetically written mark. A ghost waiting to enter!

Genevieve

Jun 29

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If I back this out of just poetry and apply it to art/creative expression in general, I think that forms can be useful - they can be a shortcut to creating a mood (or purposefully used subversively), the constraints of them can required you to think more creatively about a choice (a word, a line, etc - and sometimes that can be where something special happens), and as you mentioned - knowing about them can just be another tool in your toolbox.

Of course, on the flipside there are times that the constraints of a form absolutely stifle or simply stand in the way of what you are trying to get out - and perhaps in those cases the message is more important than adherence to the form. Put another way - you don't want the technique to distract from the impact of what you are trying to say or communicate (unless perhaps that tension is precisely what you ARE playing with/saying?).

Form and language are such big topics - and they relate in so many things from the way we read the poem to ourselves, compared to a performance of the same piece, to the way way class and culture shift word meanings, to whether or not the form is specifically designed as a meta commentary about the art or control itself - and in a lack of "form" do you sometimes still find some sort of conformity, some invisible set of rules, or are those rules just the basics of the poet's chosen language?

Mark Keller

Jun 29

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Replying to

AMEN TO ALL!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! With Adam’s short on the Descort, I would also argue that you create form just in the act of putting words together because they find their own rhythm, even though that might be informal. Your poem stands up on its own because it finds its own way and manages to find coherence because it adopts form of some kind—whether intentional or not! Form—as an entity unto itself—is what allows a poem to retain poise, polish, symmetry, substance, hold-together awareness, and integrity! The subject is so big and vast that it becomes an endless exploration that is not only fascinating, but adds to a never-ending narrative of enrichment, education, instruction, added meaning, and allows the entire collective of poets to weigh in and contribute!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! As to art, it indeed has relevance! My uncle was a professional artist and form and composition are bread-and-butter tools of the trade!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! GREAT STUFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Edited

Adam Gary

Jun 30

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Replying to

Amazingly put Genevieve! If the form is stifling the creation then it needs to be thrown to the side… violently hahaha