Scansion in Poetry

(Graphic Scansion of the Dactylic Hexameter poem "The Invader" Stanza 1)

....dactyl........dactyl..........spondee.........spondee............dactyl........spondee
......./uu.........../uu...........//...................//................./uu.............//
Soon as the| girl,  in her| night gown || closed door,| climbed on the|bedspread;|
...........................................caesura

....dactyl......spondee......dactyl........spondee......dactyl.....spondee
....../uu..........//............/uu...........//........../uu..........//
Clinging to| window| pane,|| in a| web cage;| spider on| soft lace;|
..............................caesura

...dactyl......spondee......spondee.....spondee.......dactyl......spondee
..../uu...........//...........//...........//................/uu............//
Looking in| skyline,| tall poles||stuck deep, lighting the| homestead,|
...................................caesura

.....dactyl......dactyl.........dactyl......spondee.......dactyl........spondee
....../uu........./uu........../uu...........//............../uu..............//
Tropic air| blowing in|! Spider|| in| bedroom|, crawling in| Jane's space.|
.................................caesura

Aeneid Book 1, lines 1-7 by Latin poet Virgil

1 Arma vi rumque cano, Troiae qui primus ab oris
2 Italiam, fato profugus, Laviniaque venit
3 Litora, multum ille et terris iactatus et alto
4 Vi superum saevae memorem lunonis ob iram;
5 multa quoque et bello passus, dum onderet urbem,
6 inferretque deos Latio, genus unde Latinum,
7 Albanique patres, atque altae moenia Romae.

The translation of Aeneid Book 1, lines 1-7 from Latin to English

1 I sing of arms and a man, who first came from the shores of Troy
2 To Italy, and Lavina shores exile by fate
3 Having been tossed about much both on lands and the deep
4 By the might of those above on account of the unforgotten anger of harsh Juno
5 And also having suffered much in war; until he should found a city,
6 And carrying the gods to Latium from whence came the Latin Race,
7 And the Alban fathers, and the walls of high Rome.

Click on this link for the continuation

Comments on Univocalic Poetry

In Barbados there is this Westminster System of Parliament with a two-party system: The Barbados Labour Party (BLP) commonly known as the "Bees" and the Democratic Labour Party (DLP) referred to as the "Dems". The Peoples Progressive Party (PeePeePee) has yet to be recognized as a party. This movement was formed by a member of the Democratic Labour Party who broke ranks to form this pressure movement. Members of this movement contest elections on an Independent ticket.

This party-switching or crossing the floor has taken place in the Parliamentary System of Government in Barbados in the past and most recently in this 21st Century. In Barbadian politics, crossing the floor means to leave one's political party and join another, or in more general sense, to vote against one's own party. Party-switching is the term most used in American politics, and means any change in party affiliation of a partisan public figure, usually one who is currently holding elected office; and connotes a transfer of held power from one party to another. In the United States' dominant two-party system, the switches generally occur between the Republican Party and the Democratic Party, although the archives have revealed that there have also been a number of notable switches to and from third parties, and even between third parties. Documented party switchers in modern era politics of the United States show that the majority of switchers came from the Democratic Party to the Republican Party in the deep South. In New England, the Great Lakes states, and the coastal states switched from Republican Party to the Democratic Party.

Why do politicians abandon their loyalty even though they expect such from voters? When we look at the behavior of global political establishments their politicians behave in similar fashion as far as crossing the floor or party switching. Crossing the floor originated from the British House of Commons which is configured with the Government and Opposition facing each other on rows of benches as shown in the graphic image below.

Government Members                          Opposition Members

If a politician wishes to vote against the affiliated party that politician would need to literally cross the floor to get to the other lobby and if the Member of Parliament was to switch a party that MP would need to cross the floor.

Politicians who cross the floor or switch parties would have the populace believe that they did so from an ethical obligation, because they feel their views are no longer aligned with those of their current party. Some politicians cross the floor or switch their party for an opportunistic reason but they wouldn’t say it that way. The opportunistic politician usually belongs to a minority party and would cross the floor to join the majority party to gain the advantages of belonging to such a party. However, the most important reason why politicians switch or ditch their party is “to get elected". In your neck of the woods I'm sure you know or read about politicians who have crossed the floor or have switched their parties. In British political history, Winston Churchill crossed the floor from the Conservative Party to the Liberal Party then crossed back to the Conservative Party.

That being said, I tend to believe that politicians share common characteristics: they expect absolute loyalty from voters at the polls, and think ceaselessly about the next election cycle. An example of a notable switch in Barbadian politics is Sir Errol Walton Barrow for much nobler causes, for which his legacy has given much reasons to rejoice as we celebrate forty-four year of Independence. His legacy has peeled away the narcissistic clock that tends to dog politicians for a true Statesmanship robe. We are so very proud of the contributions made by the "Father of our Independence". His stewardship has revealed, that as an elected officer, he fervently thought about the generations to come, and placed certain mechanisms in place which the now generations enjoy, and for which previous generations had no such good fortune. A fixation on the next election cycle was not his forte and that showed the true mark of a statesman; the highest rank in the political arena. Sir Errol Walton Barrow, the statesman did this as he captained the "Ship of State" during his lifetime.

This crossing of the floor phenomenon provided the inspiration to write these two poems "Dems Bees” and "Yes, Yes, Yes”. The composition took place in the parish of St James South, Barbados on September 15, 2007 during the 'silly season' when Barbadians were gearing up for their General Election show down by the Barbados Labour Party (The Bees), the Barbados Democratic Party (The Dems) and the Peoples Progressive Party (PeePeePee). In my bag of "constrained writing" you would have read alphabetic poetry written in forms such as the Acrostic, Abecedarian, Diastic, Mesostich, and Telestich. This latest insertion in the bag of "constrained writing" takes the form of Univocalic poetry. Of course, there are many other forms of constrained writing in poetry but the comments here only touched on a few such types. So what is constrained writing.

Constrained writing is a literary technique in which the writer is bound by some condition that forbids certain things or imposes a pattern. This technique is very popular in poetry which often requires the poet to use a particular verse form.

The language of English has five vowels: a e i o u. I'm thinking now of a special type of constrained poetic writing that uses only one vowel-letter, i.e. only uses one of these vowels: a e i o u. It is called Univocalic Poetry. C C Bombaugh in 1890 wrote one of the best known Univocalic that used only the vowel "o". Here is an excerpt from Bombaugh's poetry:

No cool monsoon bow on Oxford dons,
Orthodox, jog-trot, bookworm Solomons

Eunoia is Univocalic poetry written by the Canadian poet, Christian Bok. This poetry book emerged at the beginning of the 21st Century. In Chapter I for Dick Higgins all the lines use only the vowel "i" as shown in the excerpt below.

Writing is inhibiting. Sighing, I sit, scribbling in Ink
This pidgin script. I sing with nihilistic witticism,
Disciplining signs with trifling gimmicks - impish
Hijinks which highlight stick sigils. Isn't it glib?

The poems, "Dems Bees" and “Yes Yes Yes" are Univocalic poetry that make use only of the vowel "e" that jabs at Barbadian politics.

Comments on "Felony before Terror"

The poem “Felony before Terror” is written in the form of a Double Acrostic Mesostich. It was composed on August 6, 2009 at Cassia Drive, Barbados.

The title of the poem is made up of three words. Acrostics were form from the first and last words in the title and the Mesostich from the middle word in the title. The Acrostic appears on the left and right sides of the poem’s lines of verses and the Mesostich at the middle point of these same lines of verses. This poem is made up of fifty-seven words with a syllable count of eighty-five as shown in the three-column table below.

Right Side                                         Middle point       Left Side

Fires on bush put                              brave                   those souls to the test                 
5 syllables                                          1 syllable              5 syllables   = 11 syllables
(4 words)                                          (1 word)                 (5 words)      (10 words)

eager suicide bombers                     everywhere          minds overflow with evil
7 syllables                                          3 syllables            7 syllables   =  17 syllables
(3 words)                                           (1 word)                (4 words)       (8 words)

leaving plenty dreadful acts to         fall                          in the snow and thunderous rain;
8 syllables                                        1 syllable                8 syllables   =  17 syllables
(5 words)                                         (1 word)                 (6 words)      (12 words)        

obstructing the rightful                      ownership                comes from those angry rogues
6 syllables                                            3 syllables                6 syllables   = 15 syllables 
(3 words)                                             (1 word)                    (5 words       (9 words)     

nagging, in demonic                         reckless                    mindset does overflow             
6 syllables                                          2 sylables                 6 syllables      = 14 syllables 
(3 words)                                           (1 word)                   (3 words)          (7 words)

year-round, CIA                              eyes                           sieve through tuff rumors
5 syllables                                        1 syllable                   5 syllables      =  11 syllables
(5 words)                                       (1 word)                    (4 words)             10 words

For guidelines on how to write the Double Acrostic click on this link and for the Mesostich guidelines click on this link.


Comments on Haiti's Holler

The recording of the date, time and place when a poem is completed does matter. In so doing, this helps when the poem undergoes critical analysis. That being said, I composed this poem “Haiti’s Holler” in Double Acrostic on May 20, 2010 at Cassia Drive, Husbands Terrace, St. James South, Barbados. Click on this Link for guidelines for writing a Double Acrostic poem. Much grieving, bewilderment and sadness still blanketed folks as daily news unfolded through all kinds of media and graphic pictures fed the eyes of those daring to look at such. This poem reflects some of the moods and moves at that time that drew attention to natural disasters and dire consequences when Mother Nature retaliates from years of plundering and scraping of her intestines to satisfy corporate greed.

The title of this poem is very explicit as it rolls itself into the first lines of verses one recognizes that the explicit point to the earthquake that unleashed its fury on Haiti. On Tuesday, January 12, 2010 an earthquake of a catastrophic magnitude 7.0 Mw, occurred in Haiti. Its epicentre was near the town of Léogâne approximately 16 miles west of Port-au-Prince, the Capital of Haiti. By January 24, 2010 reports stated that at least fifty-two aftershocks measuring 4.5 or greater had been recorded. An estimated three million people were affected by the quake; the Haitian Government reported that an estimated 230,000 people had died, 300,000 had been injured and 1,000,000 made homeless. They also estimated that 250,000 residences and 30,000 commercial buildings had collapsed or were severely damaged. The earthquake caused major damage in Port-au-Prince, Jacmel and other settlements in the region. Many notable landmark buildings were significantly damaged or destroyed, including the Presidential Palace, the National Assembly building, the Port-au-Prince Cathedral, and the main jail. Among those killed were Archbishop of Port-au-Prince Joseph Serge Miot, and opposition leader Micha Gaillard. Hédi Annabi.

Many countries responded to appeals for humanitarian aid, pledging funds and dispatching rescue and medical teams, engineers and support personnel. Communication systems, air, land, and sea transport facilities, hospitals, and electrical networks had been damaged by the earthquake, which hampered rescue and aid efforts; confusion over who was in charge, air traffic congestion, and problems with prioritisation of flights further complicated early relief work. Port-au-Prince's morgues were quickly overwhelmed with many tens of thousands of bodies having to be buried in mass graves. On January 22, 2010 the United Nations noted that the emergency phase of the relief operation was drawing to a close, and on January 23, 2010 the Haitian government officially called off the search for survivors.

Ten months after the earthquake struck Haiti, life is returning to normal but at a snail's pace. As at the writing of this, a new wave of destruction has swept over what is left in Haiti; the deadly scourge of cholera has broken out and has claimed hundreds of lives.

The fifth line of verse in this poem alludes to the sequence of events that fell from Iceland Eyjafyallajökull volcano. This seismic activity increased on March 20, 2010 and continued on to April 14, 2010 and into May. The Eyjafyallajökull volcano ejected into the air an estimated 250 million cubic metres of tephra. The ash plume rose to a height of approximately 30, 000 ft (9 kilometres) which rates the explosive power of the eruption as a 4 on the Volcanic Explosivity Index. The behaviour of the Eyjafyallajökull volcano caused enormous disruption to air travel across western and northern Europe due to the ash mist that blackened skies and was so reluctant to move away. According to reports, due to the large quantities of dry volcanic ash lying on the ground, surface winds frequently lifted up an "ash mist" that significantly reduced visibility and made observation of the activity of the volcano through web camera impossible.

The last line verse of the poem strikes a familiar chord that everywhere around the globe disaster shows its unwanted head on a chain of events natural or man-made. The closing line of verse points to the Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill which is referred to by such names as the BP Oil Spill, Gulf of Mexico Oil Spill, BP Oil Disaster and the Macondo Blowout. This oil spill in the Gulf of Mexico flowed for three months in 2010. It started on April 20, 2010 when the Deepwater Horizon drilling rig exploded killing eleven workers and injured seventeen others. On July 15, 2010 the leak was stopped by capping the gushing wellhead after releasing into the Gulf of Mexico and estimated 53, 000 barrels per day of crude oil. On September 19, 2010 the relief well process was successfully completed and the Federal Government of the United States of America declared the well "effectively dead" but with far reaching consequences.

The oil spill caused extensive damage to marine and wildlife habitats; as well as to the Gulf's fishing and tourism industries. Skimmer ships, floating containment booms, anchored barriers, and sand-filled barricades along shorelines were used in an attempt to protect hundreds of miles of beaches, wetlands and estuaries from the spreading oil. Scientists have also reported immense underwater plumes of dissolved oil not visible at the surface. The United States Government has named British Petroleum (BP) as the responsible party, and officials have committed to holding the company accountable for all cleanup costs and other damage. After its own internal probe, BP admitted that it made mistakes which led to the Gulf of Mexico oil spill. The Deepwater Horizon Oil Spill has become the largest in United States of America's history.

Ego-less and Deterministic Poetry

Ego-less poetry is just what it is…not egocentric. Poets from the western tradition use objects as a mode to express their intellectual sentiments using a variety of poetic devices. Looking at a field of growing okras, the poet would never say, for example “okras are in bloom ready to be harvested” or in some other simple way, but will use imagery sensors to plant images in the mind’s eye of readers by probably saying “okras are pregnant from the electrifying rays of the sun, the pattering rain gleefully massaging their feet in sodden shoes with the whispering sounds of the wind in their thanksgiving dance”. So, instead of calling a spade a spade, poets from the western tradition make use of various poetic devices such as similes, metaphors, personification and symbolism for their embellishment fix. These various poetic techniques allow these poets to inject themselves within the composition whether directly or through the “voice” or persona assigned to articulate the muse.

Ego-less poetry thrives on the concept of Zen that espouses the idea that objects should be seen in their true nature and not be distorted for one’s own self-centered gratification. This overarching use of romanticism in poetry is what propels egotistic gratification. Ego-less poetry would have none of that thus avoiding the use of “self” or “I” in any form or fashion in its chance or deterministic creations. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not saying that poetry embellishment is a bad idea. On the contrary, I cannot imagine myself feasting on poetry without its seasoning and garnishes. Do you? As a side-dish, to balance the diet, ego-less poetry rises to the occasion by not putting the poet as the centre of gravity but rather as a by-stander.

Ego-less poetry is to be found in Japanese forms of poetry such as the Haiku and Senyru and in the poetry of the American poet, performance artist, composer and playwright Jackson Mac Low. He is no longer here with us in this 21st century. He died on December 8, 2004.

This diverse poet, Jackson Mac Low never referred to his poetry as “chance poetry" although other readers of his poetry did. The Dada movement of Western Europe the early and middle years of the last century in such writers as Louis Aragon and Tristan Tzara, just to mention a couple Dadaists described their creations as “chance poetry" because they used chance operations to create their poetry. It is a method of generating poetry independent of the poet’s will. A “chance operation” can be almost anything like throwing the dice, bingo or using the computer. Most poems created by chance operations use some form of “parent text” as their source. The source can be a clipping from the newspaper, magazine, poem or whatever. The purpose behind this approach is to play against the poet’s intentions and ego, while creating unusual syntax and images. The resulting poems allow the reader to take part in producing meaning from the work.

Even though Jackson Mac Low’s egoless poetry relied on a Parent Text to populate the Seed Text with his two methods, namely the Diastic reading-through procedure and the Acrostic reading-through procedure and his knowledge of the workings of computer programs that gave much inspiration he never described his creations as Chance poetry although Chance poetry uses similar platforms. He insistently referred to his brand of poetry as “deterministic” because of his use of “matched asymmetries”.

What is there to uncover about Jackson Mac Low’s brand of poetry?

With a clear understanding of computer-based applications and the knack for modifying those to suit his person Mac Low created two approaches to writing his deterministic poetry swimming in the egoless sea. A cursory analysis of his poetic creations suggests that he was not seeking answers to aleatoric and egoless forms of poetry. He was more concerned with experimenting with the various forms of computerized application programs to find out what would be the outcome when a particular algorithm was introduced into poetry. His focus was to empirically invent techniques of artistic production meeting certain criteria. The outcome of this experiment in poetry is found in two methods he created:

1.  Acrostic reading-through non-intentional text-selection procedures.

2. The Diastic reading-through non-intentional text-selection procedures. 

These two methods rely on a Source Text and a Seed Text. He employed these poetry generation techniques from April 1960 until January 1963. No doubt with the widespread use of computers in this 21st century his poetic technique has the potential of reaching even greater heights in modernistic poetry. However, the focus of this discussion is on his "Acrostic reading-through non-intentional text-selection procedures. So let's get started.

Here is how Mac Low described his Acrostic Method of Deterministic Poetry. The writer reads through a Source Text and finds successively words, phrases, sentence fragments, sentences, and or other linguistic units that have the letters of the Seed Text as their initial letters. I used this technique to produce the poem “Digging Up Earth" (Poetrynest.Blogspot.com). The next three crucial steps in the process are to identify them:

1. Source Text:
     

The 2010 Copiapó mining accident occurred on 5 August 2010, when part of the San José              copper-gold mine near Copiapó, Chile collapsed, leaving 33 men trapped deep below ground the miners survived underground for a record 68 to 69 days. All 33 were rescued and brought to the surface on 13 October 2010, with the first miner emerging from the Fénix 2 rescue capsule at 00:10 CLDT and the last at 21:55 CLDT. After the last trapped miner was winched to the surface, the rescue workers held up a sign stating "Misión cumplida Chile" English: Mission accomplished Chile to the estimated more than 1 billion people watching the rescue on live television around the world.

The San José Mine is about 45 kilometers (28 mi) north of Copiapó, in northern Chile. The miners were trapped at approximately 700 meters (2,300 ft) deep and bout 5 kilometers 3 mi from the mine entrance. The mine had a history of instability that had led to previous accidents, including death.

The retrieval of the first miner, Florencio Avalos, began on Tuesday, 12 October at 23:55 CLDT, with the rescue capsule reaching the surface 16 minutes later. By 21:55 CLDT on 13 October, all 33 miners had been rescued, almost all in good medical condition and expected to recover fully. Two miners were suffering from silicosis, one of whom also had pneumonia, and others were suffering from dental infections and corneal problems. Three of the rescued miners had immediate surgery under general anesthetics for dental problems.

The total cost of the rescue operation was estimated between US$10–20 million; a third covered by private donations with the rest coming from state-owned mining corporation Codelco and the government itself.

2.  Seeds Extracted from Source Text to Populate the poem ""Digging Up           Earth" as follows:

     The, Accident, August, part, of, gold, near, trapped, deep, ground,  history              underground, a, record, days, All, rescued, emerging, rescue, at, After, held,         up, English, accomplished, estimated, than, people, television, around, is,             about, in, northern, deep, entrance, instability, that, had, to, previous,                     accidents, including, death, retrieval, Avalos, Tuesday, rescue, reaching, tall,         and, expected,  recover, two, also,  pneumonia, dental, infections, under,               general, anesthetics,  third, donations, rest, government, itself.
     

3. Select a theme or title for the Seed Text poem as follows:
    Digging Up Earth

4. Compose the Poem

    Digging Up Earth

    

    Deep . in ground. gold . is . northern . gold

    Underground  . problems

    English . all . round . trapped . history
 
    Dig . immediate . gold. gold . in . northern .  ground
    Up . people.
    Even . a . rescue. Tuesday . had

    Dozens . in . gold . government . instability . near . ground
    Ugly . part
    Every . accomplished . rescue . two . held

    Deep . in . ground . government . instability . northern . gold
    Underground . problems
    Every. August . record . third . held

    Death . itself . gold . ground . infection . near . general
    Ultimately. pneumonia
    Even . Avalos . retrieval . television . held

    Donation. is. good . general . infections . near . ground
    Underlying part
    Emerging . accident . retrieval . Tuesday . history

    Dental . infections . ground . gold . in . near . general  

    Under . people 

    Emerging . all . round . trapped . history

Comments on Prayer

This poem “Prayer” was written on September 15, 2007 at Cassia Drive, St. James South, Barbados. It was my birthday. It takes the form of an Acrostic Reversed-Telestich in Free Verse. In reversing the forward movement of the Telestich portion of the Acrostic poem, to that of a backward motion is what created the Reversed-Telestich.

Looking at the poem, at first glance, it looks like metered poetry, but it is not. A closer look at the poem would reveal that it does not conform to established patterns of meter, rhyme and stanza.

The poems “Heroes” and “Prayer” take the form of the Acrostic Reversed-Telestich. Here are some guidelines to help you compose your first Acrostic Reversed-Telestich poem:

Firstly, make the decision as to what style you will write the Acrostic Reversed-Telestich; whether in the traditional form or in Free Verse.

Select a title for the Acrostic Reversed-Telestich. Let’s say you selected the title “Heroes”. Bearing in mind that the Reversed-Telestich starts at the end of each line of verse with that word whose last letter in reverse as shown in the graphic map below:

Acrostic side of the Poem .............. Reversed-Telestich Side of the Poem

H ...................................................... s
e ....................................................... e
r ....................................................... o
o ....................................................... r
e ....................................................... e
s ....................................................... h

Start composing the lines of verses for the poem, now that you know where the starting points are for the Acrostic and for the Reversed-Telestich sides of the poem.

At the beginning of the first line of verse, begin with the first letter in the title. Continue on this line of verse until you reach the end point and use a word that has the last letter of the title.

At the beginning of the second line of verse, begin with the second letter of title; at the end of this same line of verse, use a word that has the next last letter of the title. Continue this sequence for the remaining verses of your poem.

You can follow this procedure for any title you come up with for your Acrostic Reversed-Telestich poem.

Read your completed poem aloud, check for errors and correct any errors found.

Comments on "Heroes"

It was a cloudy day with no rain and a temperature of 28 degrees Celsius on October 10, 2010 when I wrote this short poem "Heroes" at my Cassia Drive home in St. James South on the coral island of Barbados. The poem is in the form of an Acrostic Reversed-Telestich with Tetrameter verses. This alphabetic poem is flagged under the category of “Heroism”.

Do you think that contemporary society has overuse the word “hero” for what might be easily construed as being a “good Samaritan”? Do you consider great explorers and sports-people to be heroes? Would this definition of a hero help you to make up your mind?

Bravery is usually the biggest trait of all heroes (male and female). Such persons have overcome huge obstacles to survive and to rescue others. Such persons accept the call to adventure and have overcome perils in a manner that requires courage and sacrifice in a way that benefits society in some recognizable way. Every person at sometime or other is constantly searching for a hero because a hero is someone that inspires you to lift yourself from your boot-string as it were for the greater good to self and to others.