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Meter in poetry provides rhythmic structure. Traditional forms have structured meter, while modern poetry experiments with fluidity. Qualitative and quantitative meter use stressed and unstressed syllables or syllabic weight. Feet are the basic metric unit, with various types like iambus or dactyl. Examples include dactylic hexameter and iambic pentameter. Skaldic and Old English poems use half-line and emphasize alliteration.
The function of meter in poetry is to provide a rhythmic structure to a poem. The meter governs both the lines as a whole and each individual line or couplet within each line. Traditional poetic forms have a regular and often highly structured meter, while modern poetry from the late 19th century onwards sometimes does away with meter entirely. This has led to modern poetry becoming more fluid and experimental, but also less structured.
Poetry must not use rhyme or meter. It might use syllable count or limit its length to that of a single breath as in Japanese Haiku and Tanka. Poems may also use alliteration as in Old English. Structure comes in many different forms from the epic poetry of Homer and Virgil to the minimalistic haiku of Matsuo Basho.
There are two subdivisions of meter in poetry: qualitative meter and quantitative meter. Qualitative meter uses stressed and unstressed syllables at regular intervals. Iambic pentameter is a classic example of qualitative meter. Quantitative meter is used in the poetry of classical languages such as Greek and Latin. It is based on syllabic weight, which is determined by the length of a syllable.
The lines in both types of meter in poetry are divided into feet. A foot is a specific order of syllable types almost like the deoxyribonucleic acid (DNA) in a poem. A foot, therefore, is the most basic metric unit in poetry. There are many types of feet depending on the syllables they comprise; for example, a foot with two syllables could be an iambus, one with three could be a dactyl, and one with four could be a coriamb.
The dactylic hexameter is a quantitative meter used by poets such as Homer in his “Iliad” and Virgil in the “Aeneid”. Each line consists of six feet, each of which is a dactyl or a rive. A dactyl consists of three syllables in the following order: long-short-short. A Spondeo is made up of two long syllables. The trailing foot of a meter-line dactylic hexameter in poetry is always Spondeo.
Iambic pentameter, a staple of modern English poetry, is a qualitative meter in poetry. A pentameter has five feet in a row. Each foot is an iambus, meaning it has two syllables in it. An iambic in iambic pentameter is usually an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable. There is some room for variation by having a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one, but the rhythm usually returns to normal in the next foot.
Skaldic and Old English poems use half-line. They tend to have more variation in the order of stressed and unstressed syllables within each foot. With poems like “Beowulf” and “The Battle of Maldon,” more emphasis is placed on alliteration.
