Tag Archives: does poetry need to rhyme

Is Rhyming Poetry Out?

An interesting post entitled “Is rhyming poetry out?”, followed on by a fascinating exchange of views on the question, (https://jcmannone.wordpress.com/the-poetry-classroom-2/is-rhyming-poetry-out/).
Much of my poetry is expressed in rhyme. Take, for example my poem “My Old Clock I wind”:

“My old clock I wind
And much philosophy therein find.
I can bring
The pendulum’s swing
To a stop With my hand,
Yet I can not command
Time to default
On his duty and halt
The passing of the years.
He has no ears
For our laughter and tears
And his sickle will swing on
Long after we are gone”.

I must confess to having a preference for poetry expressed in a traditional manner. That is not to say that I discount poetry written as free or blank verse (there is much good poetry expressed in diverse forms, together with some which is to my mind at least of lesser quality).

Kevin

Does Poetry Need To Rhyme?

13 Replies

A couple of days ago, an acquaintance asked me whether poetry needs to rhyme. My response was that there is no necessity as regards the use of rhyming in poetry. Eliot’s The Wasteland springs to mind as a poem where free verse is employed throughout large portions of the work.
Most of my own poetry does utilise a rhyming scheme. I feel most comfortable expressing myself in rhyme. This does not, however mean that my poems rhyme throughout, (there is no point in sticking to a rigid rhyming scheme if by so doing the poet loses the sense of what he is trying to say. It is better to have a line which doesn’t rhyme than force one and thereby garble the essence of the poem).
I would, as always be interested in your views. Does poetry need to rhyme? And at what point does poetry become poetic prose or simple prose as opposed to poetry as it is usually construed?

Kevin

Poetics

2 Replies

Should a poem conform
To some abstract
Form
Of rhyme and metre?
Trying to hard may defeat her.
The poet that is, who striving for perfection
Feels only dejection
And bangs her head
Until she sees red
Or shooting stars,
Which rhymes with cars,
But not a publishing contract,
that is a fact …