Herb Coursen
The Modes of Writing
What are the “modes” of writing? There are only two: prose and verse. The Oxford English Dictionary defines prose as "The ordinary form of written or spoken language, without metrical structure" [emphasis added], and it defines verse as "a succession of words arranged according to natural or recognized rules of prosody and forming a complete metrical [emphasis added] line. To put it even more simply, prose is unmetered language and verse is metered language.
These are the only two ways in which anything in any genre can be written. Some of the literary genres or "kinds of writing" are fiction, drama, nonfiction, and poetry. Fiction may be written in prose or verse; the same is true of drama, nonfiction, and poetry.
Prosody
In order to create, in order to mold the language, the poet must have some kind of system, or prosody — a theory of poetic composition or organizing principle — within the bounds of which he or she can build the structure of the poem. Form, then, whether it be "internal" and "organic," or "external" and "formal," is of major importance.
Unfortunately, when one says "form" many people think only of some structure that is traditional, such as the sonnet. But every element of language is a form of some kind. The letters of the alphabet are forms, conventions upon which we have agreed in order to communicate. So are words, phrases, clauses, and sentences. The poet is interested in all of these things, since his or her medium is language.
The poet may also be interested in sonnets, which are metrical forms, but at the very least he or she is interested in words and in how to put them together in language structures. This is not to say that poetry depends upon a particular organizing principle, a particular prosody, such as rhymed metrical verse. Meter is only one element of verse-mode poetry, and a prosody can be based upon any aspect of language, be it rhythm, or grammar, or figures of speech, or syllables, or words, or letters, or what-have-you. All that is necessary is that the system be unified and coherent, and that the products of the system be successful in terms of the system and in terms of the reader's perception of and response to the system.
Metered Language
"Meter" means "measure," and when one measures a line by counting something in that line, one is writing verse, not prose. In English one generally counts syllables of some sort. If one is counting merely syllables, measuring out a certain number to a line, then one is using syllabic prosody, and one is writing syllabic verse, as the ancient Irish and Welsh poets did.
If one is counting only those syllables which, for some reason, are more heavily emphasized than others, then one is using accentual prosody, and one is writing accentual verse, as the Medieval Anglo-Saxon poets did.
If one is counting not only all the syllables in the line, but all the stressed syllables as well, and arranging them in an alternating pattern of some kind, then one is using accentual-syllabic prosody, and one is writing accentual-syllabic verse, as Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare did.
The Rules of Scansion in English Verse
These are the rules governing stress in modern English:
1. In every word of the English language of two or more syllables, at least one syllable will take a stress. If one cannot at first hear the stressing, then one may consult a pronouncing dictionary.
2. Important single-syllable words, particularly verbs and nouns, but also demonstrative pronouns (this, these, that), generally take strong stresses.
3. Unimportant single-syllable words in the sentence, such as articles, prepositions, and pronouns (except demonstrative pronouns) do not take strong stresses, though they may take secondary stresses through promotion or demotion, depending on their position in the sentence or the line of verse.
4. In any series of three unstressed syllables in a line of verse, one of them, generally the middle syllable, will take a secondary stress through promotion, and the promoted syllable will stand in place of a stressed syllable.
5. In any series of three stressed syllables in a line of verse, one of them, generally the middle syllable, will take a secondary stress through demotion, and the demoted syllable will stand in place of an unstressed syllable.
CAN POEMS BE WRITTEN IN PROSE
Constructional Schemas
Some non-metrical systems for writing poetry are based upon schemas: sets of correlated things such as grammatically parallel sentence structures, and these systems ought properly to be considered as prose prosodies when verse systems are not in use for structuring poems. Parallel sentence structures are constructional schemas, and the prosody that uses them is called grammatical parallelism. One such prosody was practiced by the ancient Hebraic poets who derived their system from the even more ancient Chaldeans.
Grammatical prosodies, then, are really the oldest and simplest systems traditional in the western world, if not in the whole world. The work of the Hebraic poets may be found in English in the Bible; specifically, in the King James version, published in 1611, though other English versions had appeared earlier, and versions in Latin, Greek, French, and other languages circulated in Britain since the middle ages.
Grammatical Parallelism
Parallel structure is the structure of symmetrical lists within the sentence. These lists may be parts of speech, such as infinitives (I like to run, to jump, and to swim); proper nouns, (Alice, Bill, and James like to exercise); prepositions (This is a government of, by, and for the people); phrases (This is a government of the people, by the people, and for the people); gerunds (I like running, jumping, and swimming); independent clauses (I came, I saw, I conquered), or any other sentence elements, even compound elements such as subjects and predicates (Alice, Bill, and James like to run, jump, and swim). The controlling word is "symmetrical lists," for one does not write, "I like to run, jumping, and to swim," even though the sentence makes sense. The elements of the list, of the catalogue, must be in the same form.
Probably few readers noticed that there was one paragraph above that was, nevertheless, constructed quite obviously of grammatical parallels. If it is reprinted here and each parallel is isolated, the parallelism will be apparent:
If one is counting merely syllables, measuring out a certain number to a line, then one is using syllabic prosody, and one is writing syllabic verse, as the ancient Irish and Welsh poets did.
If one is counting only those syllables that, for some reason, are more heavily emphasized than others, then one is using accentual prosody, and one is writing accentual verse, as the Medieval Anglo-Saxon poets did.
If one is counting not only all the syllables in the line, but all the stressed syllables as well, and arranging them in an alternating pattern of some kind, then one is using accentual-syllabic prosody, and one is writing accentual-syllabic verse, as Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare did.
Here is a prose poem; the prose is kept unlineated, but each clause ends with the same prepositional phrase separated from the rest of the sentence by three hiatal dots:
COOL TOMBS
When Abraham Lincoln was shoveled into the tombs, he forgot the copperheads and the assassin...in the dust, in the cool tombs.
And Ulysses Grant lost all thought of con men and Wall Street, cash and collateral turned ashes...in the dust, in the cool tombs.
In the next clause Sandburg added still other techniques from the sonic level of the traditional lyric: internal rhyme, (haw, pawpaw), alliteration (Pocahontas, poplar, pawpaw), assonance, and vocalic and consonantal echo:
Pocahontas' body, lovely as a poplar, sweet as a red haw in November or a pawpaw in May, did she wonder? does she remember?...in the dust…in the cool tombs.
Take any streetful of people buying clothes and groceries, cheering a hero or throwing confetti and blowing tin horns...tell me if the lovers are losers...tell me if any get more than the lovers...in the dust...in the cool tombs.
— Carl Sandburg
There are other parallel structures in this poem besides the refrain: the repetition of phrases, for instance, "tell me if," and the catalogue of actions, "buying," "cheering," "throwing," all borrowed from the practice of the Bible in which there are four major types of parallel grammatical structures that may be isolated: synonymous parallelism, synthetic parallelism, antithetical parallelism, and climactic parallelism:
The synonymous parallel is a line form in a poem written in a symmetrical list of grammatical parallels in which the second half of a clause paraphrases the first half:
The sun is setting; / heaven’s fire flickers in the west.
The synthetic parallel is a line form in a poem written in a symmetrical list of grammatical parallels in which the second half of a colause gives a consequence of the first half:
In the sky there is darkness; / birds settle out of the air.
The antithetical parallel is a line form in a poem written in a symmetrical list of grammatical parallels in which the second half of a clause rebuts the first half:
All things are silent; / the stillness is a tumult.
The climactic parallel is a line form that is the apex of a poem written in a symmetrical list of grammatical parallels in which each succeeding clause in the series builds to a climax:
Night walks out of the mountains to lie upon the land.
In his poem "Chicago," Carl Sandburg combined one technique from the craft of short fiction, the circle-back ending, with a repetitional schema, the refrain, and the parallel structure of the catalogue. The first strophe (section) of the poem reads,
CHICAGO
Hog Butcher for the World,
Tool Maker, Stacker of Wheat,
Player with railroads and the Nation's Freight Handler;
Stormy, husky, brawling,
City of the Big Shoulders:
and the last reads,
Laughing the stormy, husky, brawling laughter of Youth,
half-naked, sweating, proud to be Hog Butcher, Tool Maker,
Stacker of Wheat, Player with Railroads and Freight Handler
to the Nation.
— Carl Sandburg
Clearly, the first strophe is little more than the prose of the last strophe line-phrased or, to use a current term, "lineated"; that is, the dependent clause is lineated according to the phrases of which the clause is comprised. To put it another way, the last strophe is the first strophe unlineated.
We can illustrate by taking an example we used earlier and breaking it up into line phrases so that it will more closely resemble verse — what many people erroneously call "free verse." That phrase is clearly a contradiction in terms, for "verse," in which some sort of syllables are being counted, cannot be free. Lineating a prose passage does not convert it to verse, nor does it convert one genre — fiction, drama, or nonfiction (as in this case) — to the genre of poetry:
If one is counting merely syllables,
measuring out a certain number to a line,
then one is using syllabic prosody,
and one is writing syllabic verse,
as the ancient Irish and Welsh poets did.
If one is counting only those syllables which,
for some reason,
are more heavily emphasized than others,
then one is using accentual prosody,
and one is writing accentual verse,
as the Medieval Anglo-Saxon poets did.
If one is counting not only all the syllables in the line,
but all the stressed syllables as well,
and arranging them
in an alternating pattern of some kind,
then one is using accentual-syllabic prosody,
and one is writing accentual-syllabic verse,
as Geoffrey Chaucer and William Shakespeare did.
Here is a short poem made of the lines used above to illustrate the four major prose parallels of the Bible:
SERENADE
The sun is setting; heaven's fire flickers in the west.
In the sky there is darkness; birds settle out of the air.
All things are silent; the stillness is a tumult.
Night walks out of the mountains to lie upon the land.
If we were to line-phrase this quatrain, we might fool someone into
believing it is written in some sort of verse mode called "free
verse":
The sun is setting;
heaven's fire flickers in the west.
In the sky there is darkness;
birds settle out of the air.
All things are silent;
the stillness is a tumult.
Night walks out of the mountains
to lie upon the land.
Here is one of the greatest of all sports poems, a catalogue:
NATIONAL PASTIME
Dedicated to Cookie Lavagetto
I hereby establish my own Baseball Hall of Fame.
For alliteration, for example, I enshrine
Frankie Frisch, the Fordham Flash.
For future fame in other areas:
Albert Schweitzer (St. Louis AL — 1909-1911).
They called him "Cheese," so with him
I further honor Clarence Beers and Sweetbreads Bailey,
Hot Potato Hamlin and Noodles Hahn, Ginger Beaumont,
Sugar Cain and Honey Walker (from Beeville, Texas),
as well as Bob Sturgeon, Oyster Burns, Catfish Hunter,
Sea Lion Hall, and George Haddock, whose locker
was next to Davy Jones's. I add sure fingered
Tom Butters, Peanuts Lowery, Pretzels Puzzullo,
Luke Appling, Eddie Bacon, and Puddin' Head Jones,
George Bone and Stew Bolen, Rabbit Maranville
and Bunny Brief, Dave Brain, and Dodo Bird,
Turkeyfoot Brower, Deerfoot Bay, and Raindeer Killifer.
Since one must be mad or built like a
Bench to play catcher, immortalized also
are Earl Battey and Matt Batts.
A special velvet lined niche for the man
who led the senior circuit in hits in 1926 (with 201):
Glass Arm Eddie Brown.
I add another Brown: Mordecai Peter Centennial
(born, of course, in 1876), also known as
"Three Finger" Brown, because that's how many
he used to throw the ball (229 and 131: lifetime).
But M.P.C. "T.F." Brown must yield his share
of one great gallery in my special Hall to
Christian Frederick Albert John Henry David
Betzel, whom they called "Bruno" for some reason.
My Hall of Fame will house an armory, as some
museums do, for the display of weapons, like
Shotgun Shuba, Gunboat Gumbert,
Boom Boom Beck, Roxy Snipes, Ray Blades, and
Poison Ivy Andrews, who will be endowed with
a glass case all his own. And, of course, a chapel for
Preacher Roe, Deacons Scott, MacFayden,
and Law, Howie Nunn, Johnny Priest,
Maurice Archdeacon, Max Bishop, and Dave Pope.
— H. R. Coursen, Jr.
Suggested Writing Exercise:
Write a sixteen-sentence prose poem, each sentence to consist of independent clauses in pairs utilizing the four parallel Hebraic systems: synonymous parallel; synthetic parallel, antithetical parallel, and climactic parallel (which may contain more than just two clauses in a catalogue).
