Writing with Rhymes

Since we’ve talked about rhymes before, you can find previous posts on the subject by typing “rhyme” or other key word in the Search box. Today, though, I’m thinking about the ongoing popularity of rhyming poems and what might be helpful in writing poems that rhyme. 

• Pick rhymes with ample word choices that echo the sound. For example, "care" has many options such as "bare," "dare," "fare," "hair," "lair," "mare," "pair," "rare," "share," "spare," "stare," "there," "ware," and"where."
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• Make sure the rhymes have the same rhythm, stressing the same syllable in both words. i.e. "AsPARaGUS" has the same syllabic emphasis as "don't DARE to FUSS," which might work in a humorous poem.
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• Whenever possible, use rhyming nouns you can picture or verbs that move those pictures along. 
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• Use strong rhymes at the end of lines to add emphasis to the overall poem. 
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• Avoid rhyming words that show no picture or movement. For instance, don’t end lines with identifiers such as “an” or “the.” Also avoid prepositions such as “of” for end-line rhymes. 
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• Like other words in a poem, rhymes must contribute something. For example, they can add drama, humor, or imagery, along with their interesting sounds. 
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• Read your work aloud and listen for its musicality. You can amplify the sound by looking for words within each line that have synonyms with similar consonants as the rhymes. 
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• Repeating vowels sounds can be effective, too, and is usually more subtle. 
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• Consider using a rhyming dictionary to get you over hard spots. Or test every letter of the alphabet with the main rhyming sound. Say, for instance, you end a line with the word “able.” Going through the alphabet gives you “cable,” “fable,” “label,” “Mabel” (maybe for a humorous poem or limerick), “stable,” and “table.” 
  
  

If you have questions about rhyming or other aspects of poetry, feel free to ask in the Comment section below, and, Lord willing, I'll respond in an upcoming post. Also, be sure to Subscribe so you don’t miss responses and other info you might want to know to improve the quality of your poems. 

Until next time…. 

 

 Mary Harwell Sayler

Placing rhymes

In traditional verse, rhymes usually take place at the end of a line and are, therefore, called end-rhyme in end-line rhyme position.  Poets use that pattern so often, we assume end-rhyme appeals to poetry readers too, but, despite its popularity, it does have its drawbacks. 

One problem can be a jingle-jangle effect that’s especially jarring when lines come to an abrupt halt. In light forms, such as limericks or other humorous verse, jingles can be effective, but in serious verse, heavy end-line rhymes can ruin a tone or mood.

 

To soften the jingle-jangle jolt of rhymes, try these techniques:

 

• Build up an echo, internally within the lines, by choosing words with similar vowel sounds.

 

• Let "liquids" flow in the consonants you select – for instance, rhymes containing l, m, n, r. (If you say those letters aloud, you'll hear their flow.)

 

• Drop the syllabic stress at the end of lines by using rhymes that have a down-beat or a last syllable without any emphasis.

 

• Try alliteration within the lines to soften the end-line rhyming sounds.

 

• Use enjambment.

 

For more on enjambment, see the previous post, “Enjambment and rhyme placement tone down jangling rhymes.”

 

For more on alliteration, see "Using Alliteration for Sound Echoes and for Fun."

For other aspects of poetry, type the word you want into the box that says "Search this blog" at the top right of the page. 

©2021, Mary Harwell Sayler, from her book, A Poet’s Guide to Writing Poetry

 

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Blank Verse Versus Free Verse

Have you ever met a person who reminds you of someone else? The two may look alike or express themselves with similar gestures, but after you get to know them, you might see they’re not alike at all. The primary characteristic you first noticed may be the only one they share. That's how it is with blank verse versus free. People often confuse the two, thinking they’re the same although they have little in common – with one big exception:

Neither blank verse nor free verse has regular end-line rhyme.

The following might help to clarify:

• Free Verse is free of all preconceived patterns or fixed forms. 

Free verse often has no rhymes whatsoever, but it’s just as likely to have true and/or slant rhymes tucked less conspicuously into its lines. Notice, for example, the true rhyming pair receive/believe in the poem “After Shock” and the slant rhymes thicket/wet and guarding/Garden. If you read aloud the poem (derived from the biblical book of Genesis), you’ll also hear sound echoes of resonating vowels and repeated consonants.

After Shock

When we awoke, we found ourselves

in a thicket of trees, the man called a forest –

our eyes too wet to see.

The boys had disappeared,

most likely exploring,

but the flaming torches

guarding the Garden had long

been leafed from sight.

Is this called sorrow?

Are we banished from God

forever?

Oh, why did we agree to receive

more than our Maker had made?

How could we believe that sliver

of truth in a slithering serpent?

by MaryHarwell Sayler from poetry book, Lost in Faith, ©2017

Free verse follows its own unique shape. It has the freedom to freely use or not use rhyme, rhythm, or meter – unless any of those features falls into a regular pattern.

Metaphorically speaking, free verse is a stream flowing freely within interesting, irregular, and sometimes surprising boundaries. Conversely:

• Blank Verse is rhythmic poetry blank of end-line rhymes.

In blank verse, the lines do not end in rhyming pairs even though the form is “traditional verse,” which usually does have a rhyming pattern. However, blank verse most often follows tradition with a sonnet structure of 14 rhythmic lines.

Figuratively speaking, blank verse is like a drinking glass used for tiny sips of water but appropriate for large gulps too. In classical English literature,  blank verse has occasionally been the medium for epic poems or plays, generally confining itself to metered verse set in iambic pentameter such as loosely shown here in sonnet length:

Blank Verse on a Blackboard

School children leaning over the flat world

of their desks symbolize tomorrow. How

will the chin lift, the back straighten, the eyes

refocus in time to come around in time

for the circle’s revolution from straight line

into that ongoing entity of spin and spin? 

We sat still once to become conversant

in the past’s apparent presence in pyramids, 

ancient cultures, and Babel's complex

structure – tortuous and convoluted, like

fault lines in the earth where quakes occur

below a city built to outlast blasts of when.

Who knows what we can learn from turning

pages – poured over, revised, and read again?

by MaryHarwell Sayler from the poetry book, Faces in a Crowd, ©2016

As you experiment with blank verse and free verse writing, you might discover you want the predictable, reserved blank verse for everyday company, while enjoying the spontaneity of free verse to help your writing flow, freely, into new terrain.

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Note: The above post primarily came from the Christian Poet’s Guide to Writing Poetry e-book. For more information about blank verse and free verse, you can also type the topic of your choice into the Search box on this blog page to find related discussions.

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Enjambment and rhyme placement tone down jangling rhymes

Rhyming poetry often gets criticized for bringing readers to a full stop at the end of a line where words loudly jingle-jangle. The effect works well in nursery rhymes and humorous verse as reverberations add to the sense of play, levity, and humor, but in serious poetry, jingles seem to annoy free verse lovers and poetry critics!

To retain your rhymes but tone them down, a couple of workable options depend on how you break the lines.

1. Change the placement of rhyming pairs from end-line rhymes to internal rhymes. Making this happen is just like it sounds. i.e., Move lines around until the rhyming words appear inside a line, rather than at the end. Here’s an example from my Speaking Peach chapbook:


Accent
by Mary Harwell Sayler

Maybe it's my low voice, slow drawl, or way
of saying, "Y'all," (meaning, of course, a choice
of two or more individuals), but for some reason,

most people – male or female – think I need
some help. "Here let me do that for you," they
say, just trying to be kind. Most of the time,

I do not mind the opportunity to be cradled,
even coddled, by bolder folk than I –
those who feel best when they assist, but
perhaps I should resist the temptation

to be babied, even though I must persist
in a voice too hushed to sound insistent.


If you read the poem aloud, you’ll hear the rhymes – hopefully echoing without jangling – within the lines and also within some of the words – for example, voice/choice, way/say, drawl/y’all, assist/resist/persist/insistent.


2. Use enjambment to soften the ring of rhymes. This technique lets you place rhymes at the end of the lines for couplets or other traditional forms such as sonnets or villanelles that have a distinctive rhyme scheme pattern. Instead of coming to a full stop on each end-line rhyme, however, you keep the sentence going onto the next line or beyond. As an example of enjambment, here’s a poem from my Winning the Wars chapbook.


Postcard after the Scene
by Mary Harwell Sayler

In straight lines strung with golden light, the sun-
washed houses make a pleasing sight – the ones

still left, that is. Some stores stay open if they can:
sidewalk café, hair dresser, and vegetable stand,

but what I’ve seen seems pitiful and bleak.
Someone said five officers were killed last week

by a rifle. I didn’t hear the gun explode,
but I saw stone-silent shadows as we rode

through town in trucks. Our camp sits on a hill,
overlooking a village: so beautiful before blood spilled.


In that poem, “can” and “bleak” come to a full stop, but for the other lines, enjambment wraps the sentence around a rhyme before slowing down to a softened sound.

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© 2012, Mary Harwell Sayler, all rights reserved.

 
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