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Many kinds of Free-verse

If free-verse is a fad so is cinema and so is the paperback.
So I wanted to write about free verse because I’ve gotten tired of people saying free-verse has no structure or that it is just a fad.  If free-verse is a fad, so is cinema and so is the paperback.  If you feel like you need to say “I just don’t get it” then perhaps this little essay will help.  I hope it is even more helpful to the younger poets who write without knowing how or why.  

So for those of you who don’t know, rhyme and meter are memory devices for remembering poems.  Once everything was written as poetry, even history and science.  This was useful because people didn’t own books.  If you wanted to have a bit of information in your ‘personal library’ you would need remember the poem.  People used to think in rhyming couplets(much as if you spend a few months in France you’ll start thinking in French).  Now, however, it is much harder for us to think or write in this way(just as it is hard for me to write in French).  It just doesn’t come naturally to us any more.  As the need for the memory device disappears so does our aptitude for it.  With radio and television, and yes, the internet, we move towards new forms of poetry.  Free-Verse.

When I read free-verse as a whole, I see gigantic differences within the genre.  I find it useful to divide free-verse into families.  (FYI: I know the poet doesn’t need to classify the poem.  These families are artificial, and tend to happen AFTER the poem has been written.  Then people give a name to the style of poetry and make poor imitations if it for years, until someone comes along with the vision to break all the rules(but you gotta know the rules to break ‘em))  I believe I’ve seen nine different families of  free-verse.  These families are NOT exclusive.  Your poem might be a hybrid, or might be something else entirely.  Remember, I’ve just made all this up, so don’t take it too seriously.

FALSE VERSE
This poem plays with rhyme and rhythm, but doesn’t use a set pattern.  This poem is usually playful using lighthearted rhyme, but not afraid to break that rhyme.  Sometimes rhymes might be buried in the middle of the poem, de-emphasizing the rhyme.   Often this poem is in stanzas, of unequal length but not always.  This poem often sounds  “sing-song”, usually producing a humorous effect.  For an example of this poem see Sylvia Plath’s Soliloquy of the Solipsist.

BALLAD
The ballad is an ancient form of poetry used my minstrels and singers.  The new ballads are easily seen in Popular songs.  The ballad is always written out in stanzas,  usually between three and five lines long.  Often the ballad has a chorus repeated either every other stanza or perhaps only twice.  Sometimes the chorus might be a whole stanza, sometimes just one line- the last line of every stanza, or just twice.  The repetition of the chorus is the strength of the ballad.  If the chorus is strong, it is a good chance your ballad will be good.  See the Mountain by Elisabeth Bishop, or just go to your music collection.

MINI BALLAD
This Ballad has no chorus.  Like the ballad, it has short stanzas.  This poem is not very long, and does not have the same musical feel the Ballad has, but the spacing between the lines does give it a light airy quality.  Check out Snail by Denise Levertov or Endings by Derrek Wallcot.  I must admit there is little difference between Ballad and Mini-Ballad.   I don’t know if Mini Ballad even needs it’s own family.  Does it?

TERSE
First of all Terse means thick.  Textured.   The terse poem is like a poem sandwich.  It is heavy because it is nothing but a stack of descriptions, actions and emotions; with little room for pronouns, adverbs, and even little room for complete sentences. This poem might have a lot of punctuation, as one thought will be sandwiched inside another, inside another. Or it might just have a lot of line breaks with few extra words(like the or a or I(the I is often implied) ) This poem often feels like a bowel movement as it is thick and often not pretty.  It  may be long or short, but the longer it is the more difficult for the reader.  For an example see Nearing Forty by Derrek Wallcot or A Defeat in the Green Mountains by Levertov.

SPARCE
This poem is also a kind of sandwich, but uses blank spaces to add breath and rhythm.  These are often more playful than Terse poems,  and tend to play with word placement.  There are no rules to spacing of lines and words, although different placement make different effect.  Probably something  to do with the speed it takes your eyes to find the next word(s) after the space/line-break.  This is usually a very fun poem to write/read. Check out Bullfrogs to Fireflies to Moths by Levertov, or just about anything by E.E.Commings- Commings is neat because he’ll divide a word in half and use the line break to create breath as well as using space, comma, and parenthesis.  I would give you some titles of his work but he didn’t seem to like titles.  Fun stuff.

VISUAL
Once again all ‘rules’ go out the window.  This poem might form a picture with words, or it may just write vertically as well as horizontal and even in circles.  The key is that this poem makes a visual pattern on your page.  A butterfly or a heart shape or just abstract art.  Pretty self explanatory really.  Very playful and fun to write, but not as fun to read(as much as glance at).  Word choice can be difficult.  Anyone have any examples?  I can’t think of any.

BEAT
Not rhythm, beatnik.  Beatniks made this style popular.  Usually each line is a run on sentence so large you need big lungs to read it aloud.  Each ‘line’ starts on the right margin, continues to the left margin and then continues again on the next line indented.  You shouldn’t breathe until the end of the ‘line’ - the next unindented line.  This poem might be described as ‘basically a rant’ as the words are said with considerable force(you try breathing like that).  Not pretty, but forceful and often full of emotion.  For an example look at Sunflower Sutra by Allen Ginsberg.

PURE THOUGHT
These poems are written by poets who want to make personal transformation and discovery via poem.  They don’t want to fool around with literary device or wordplay or even editing.  They just want to express-understand their emotional state.  Unfortunately this is harder than it sounds.  Cliché’s are very common in this form> lines like “I love you more than anything” often spring into our heads while writing poems without any filtering process.  Not many of these poems are published for that very reason, but this doesn’t mean your poem cannot evoke a special feeling, but beware that feeling might be nausea.  These poem are cheesy.  I’ve written a lot of them myself; they are safe hidden in my journals or sometimes even in the ashes of my fireplace.  

EPIC
A longer poem.  Most of these styles of free verse can be made into an epic(I think the epic is shorter now because television has made our attention span so much shorter)  This poem can be one big poem or a collection of shorter poems.  Check  In the Waiting Room by Elisabeth Bishop or Poem for a Birthday by Sylvia Plath(this poem is one of my favorites).


So remember, I just made all this stuff up.   Poetry is not painting by numbers.  Language is alive.  It changes as we change, or it dies.

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1 - 23 of 23

  • RedSkye
    June 23
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    When I was really young, I thought that poetry had to rhyme and stick to a certain meter. Then in 8th grade, my English teacher asked us to write a "free verse poem," which she described as a poem that doesn't necessarily adhere to all the normal patterns and rules. That experience taught me that the only true "rule" for poetry is that it should use artistic and/or interesting language to develop its point(s). As you said, "Poetry is not painting by numbers"--there is no one correct way to do it.

    I agree with an earlier comment that the problem at hand is the rampant abuse of the free verse form by wannabe poets who don't know or care to learn the "rules" of the more traditional forms. Like you said, you have to know the rules to break them. Free verse is a great form of poetry and expression when done well, and there are definitely categories within the general group.
    This was a very interesting article, thank you for sharing your thoughts. :]


  • George Bowling
    March 10, 2008
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    "If you wanted to have a bit of information in your ‘personal library’ you would need remember the poem. People used to think in rhyming couplets(much as if you spend a few months in France you’ll start thinking in French)."

    People think in languages. Some words in those languages rhyme. These are remembered easier: people did not think in couplets. I have read umpteen couplets (and written plenty aswell), and I do not ever think in them. I think you are taking rhyme's utilitarian use and running with it. Furthermore, I can honestly say, that, being Dutch and having lived in Australia for 18 years, my monologue did not switch languages, let alone after a few months.

    "Now, however, it is much harder for us to think or write in this way (just as it is hard for me to write in French)."

    It is harder for you to write in French because you do not speak it fluently. The same applies to rhyme, it is only a matter of practice.

    "It just doesn’t come naturally to us any more. As the need for the memory device disappears so does our aptitude for it. With radio and television, and yes, the internet, we move towards new forms of poetry. Free-Verse. "

    Genetics disagrees. Do you really believe our brains could've lost these capabilities in a few poultry generations? Yes, rhyme triggers memory. Yes, now we have books. No, our aptitude has not changed.

    I am a fan of free verse, but not of amateurism. Free verse is not inherently GOOD any more than metered poetry, it is professionalism or its antithesis that determines quality.

    Language is alive. We keep it alive, or we kill it. Whose side are you on?

  • Hawkeyes
    January 9, 2005
    Edit | Reply

    fine.

    I know that I made a comment on this earlier but I am reviewing this. I will probably review alot of things in allpoetry and hope it can help me become a better writer along the way. I would rank this fine.

  • Hawkeyes
    November 22, 2004
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    fine

    I think thia can help me write better poetry and hope to get some inspiration from this column. I think I would rank this fine.

  • onion-flower
    November 27, 2003
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    This was not meant to be a rant against Rhyme. Although I was a bit angry at people who were making generalizations about free verse(ironic huh?)so I might have gotten carried away. I actually really like rhyme when it is used well. Rhyme is perhaps more alien to us now, as we are not constantly reading and reciting it, and thus harder to use well.


  • November 22, 2003
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    Rhyme is a bit like cadence in music. In Mozart it can be predictable, but not less beautiful for that. In Schoenberg we find an alternative syntax, and none the less beautiful for that. If you want to post some sort of polemic against rhyme, that's your prerogative, but the idea that rhyme is nothing more than a sort of mnemonic is historically dubious, to say the least. Made me giggle.

  • Goss98
    August 6, 2003
    Edit | Reply
    The problem is not free verse. The problem is when poems abuse free-verse, just like they abuse rhyme. A poem is not about the rhyme, or the lack thereof. It's about the image being conveyed and the theme being developed. Free verse is abused when it's used as an excuse not to write well, to put down any old thing that comes into one's head and not edit it or try to make it interesting. The advantage with metered rhyme is that at least it sounds catchy-- sort of like Top 40 radio.


  • K.E. Morris
    August 3, 2003
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    i loved how you described free verse in the introduction as almost a thing of our time as a definite rhyme and rhythm as something that was more than anything a functional device for people in the past. i think all my poems except for one on this site are classified as "beat" (and before i read this i had no idea what to call them!)...so thanks for the insight you put into this. a very thought provoking read that kind of cleared things up for me

  • rozz669
    July 10, 2003
    Edit | Reply

    ya

    well put...keep it up


  • Bigmammajen
    July 10, 2003
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    I really liked this.
    I used to write all rhyming poems, but once I found I could say what i wanted without having to sit and think of a word to go with it, everything started sounding better.

    I go to open mic poetry night every monday. We just had the entire Seattle Poetry Slam Team come visit us last week, its freaking amazing to watch them and hear them and it is all free verse, and the most powerful, impacting thing I have ever heard.

    the thing about poetry is, its completely different when you read it on a page, than when the poet reads it aloud themselves, with voice changes, emotions grabbing and dangling at the end of a line, breaths, pauses, yelling....its just incredible. if you ever get a chance to see anything like that, I highly recommend it. I should post some of my photos from Monday....hmmmmmmm

  • susanne
    July 10, 2003
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    great write

    Hi Onion Flower, enjoyed your article. I guess when it comes to free verse I've written them all!

  • ngr
    July 9, 2003
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    excellent tips.thanks a lot

    I agree with you.If your grandchild is writing a letter to you,
    when he/she started going to school,what do you do?Do you thank him/her for writing in his/her tender hands,in different ways,
    or Do you start criticising him/her for not writing good English,or grammatically?
    we see the woods and not the trees,Don't we?
    Give everyone a chance to do what they like,but see that they don't cross the red signals.


  • naena
    July 9, 2003
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    When it comes to poetry...we all have our favorites. I prefer rhyme..but not above substance. I want a poem to grab my attention..command my eyes...caress my soul! I admire you for stepping up in this commentary! Though free-verse is, by definition, unstructured...due to obvious reoccurrence..it seems some definite "styles" are developing. One thing I would like to see is some people taking it easy here! I've noticed several criticisms of free verse and some harsh comments regarding meter and punctuation. It's getting to be too much! It is okay to admire structured poetry...to feel committed to meter and rhyme. But it is not okay to push your preferences or beliefs on your fellow poets. I've even see people go so far as to declare that certain types of poetry are not poetry at all! I think it is taking a verbal step too far to stating opinion as fact. Some people hunger for structure..and some hunger for a powerful message...some for both. But in the end...poetry is divided by form...but poets shouldn't be! Poetry should bring us together!

    Oh..I do get carried away some times! But thanks for the read and I do agree!

  • onion-flower
    July 8, 2003
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    I sort of want my own head really.


  • Cristos
    July 8, 2003
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    a nice topic to protect i imagine, one's thoughts and words, and claim that free verse often has style...it is its lack of style that gives it its name, i think...i enjoyed reading this though, you somehow found a way to make up little categories, and some would have your head for that...hehehe...interesting thoughts...
    good luck with everything
    peace
    chris


  • Barbara gold member
    July 8, 2003
    Edit | Reply
    I like writing free verse. It's a great way to get a thought down, without having to stop to find the right words that ryhme, or fit a certain way. If it ends up rhyming, great...if not, that's great too.

    If done well, it can flow nicely and have a mystical feeling to it, and you don't even notice that it doesn't rhyme. Poetry is an art form, and art is forever changing, forever evolving.

    Is free verse a fad? No idea, really. It may be, or it may not be...nor do I really care. I enjoy writing it at times, and that's all that really matters to me.

    My Webster's Dictionary defines a poem as: an arrangement of words, esp. a rhythmical composition, sometimes rhymed, in a style more imaginative than ordinary speech


  • butterflyinflight
    July 8, 2003
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    I completely agree!

    Very interesting point of view, and I agree with it. Somepeople tell me, "Free verse poetry is not poetry." Well, it's called free verse POETRY....It's poetry. I tried to explain to them that there are other poetic devices besides rhyme, but they remained stubborn on the issue. What someone above said before, though...I wonder if "free" verse poetry CAN be categorized? Interesting thought....
    Great little essay, I enjoyed it. Very cool!
    -butterflyflight
    Edited on Jul 08, 8:06 p.m. because 'of typos'.


  • Nam
    July 8, 2003
    Edit | Reply
    Definition of free verse in 4 dictionaries I own:
    'Verse composed of variable, usually unrhymed lines having no fixed metrical pattern.'

    So, if all those people who complain about people writing in free verse that it doesn't 'rhyme' may be they should first learn to know what they are talking about.

  • onion-flower
    July 8, 2003
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    yes Andrew I agree 100%- free verse is not really in categories- I never think that way when I write poetry, but I do see how the ways we write effect the way the poem feels. These categories just simplify things for easier understanding.

    I really love older poetry too. I love especially Coleridge and Shakespeare and Blake. (Sometimes I wish people would stop using heroic couplets. Very difficult, and really atrocious when done poorly)


  • AndrewHide silver member
    July 8, 2003
    Edit | Reply
    A very interesting piece you clearly have put some thought into this, well done.
    Personnally I tend to disagree with some of your thoughts, (this is not a critique just my oppinion,) as far as freeverse being a fad, only time will tell, but in my oppinion it proberly is only a fashion which will go in and out of the top slot as time passes just the same way as other poetry forms have in the past such as the sonnet, (in each of it's forms,) the cinquain, the ballard and pretty well every other form.
    I've never though of freeverse falling into catigories, I always assumed it to be "free" of catigorization, I shall be more aware now.
    I agree that rhyme and meter have been memory devices but I also believe some people enjoy the rhythmic sway, after all we all still listern to songs based on the same principles.

    This is a good and welcome thought provoking piece, one I shall definately think more about.

    Andrew


  • Daoine
    July 8, 2003
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    Thank you, sometimes people just want to be heard, not screamed at about rhym and meter. I have seen a few critics here who pick apart a poem, telling the person what they think would sound better without really reading or listening to the tone, inflection, or really seeing between the lines. I don't know how many times I've been IM'd by a poet thanking me because I'm just about the only person who has taken the time to do this and I understood their point. I very rarely mention grammer, not unless it is like way off, and when I do I try not to mess with the original meaning of the poem set by the poet. Poetry is supposed to be fun and/or cathartic no matter what kind of verse. Great essay.
    Edited on Jul 08, 11:13 because ''.

  • Jay-Piksie
    July 8, 2003
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    Awesome

    THANK YOU VERY MUCH!!! i write A LOT of free verse and i am constantly being criticized negitively because " it doesnt rhyme". this essay defiately gives us all an insight on what free verse really is and gives defintion to it. it's not just a "story" written in poetry format like everyone else thinks it is. i personally enjoy writing free verse. like i said, thank you so much for sharing this essay. it's very informative.

    Jessica aka Jay-Piksie

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