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 Poetry: September 23, 2015 Issue [#7224] |
  Poetry This week: Rhythm without Rhyme ~ Blank Verse Edited by: Kate - Writing & Reading   More Newsletters By This Editor   1. About this Newsletter 2. A Word from our Sponsor 3. Letter from the Editor 4. Editor's Picks 5. A Word from Writing.Com 6. Ask & Answer 7. Removal instructions 
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Poetry is not necessarily carved of twenty-dollar words, but shows an image with both picturesque and plain words. The rising sun carves rainbows in the fog. Plain, understandable words, are they not? 
Blank verse does not have ending rhymes (for the most part) and can be composed of any amount of feet (rhythmic pattens) but are most familiarly the iambic pentameter. That is two beat syllables soft and hard, iAM iAM iAM iAM iAM (iamb 5 times in a line). And you will find, as in natural speech, other meters interspersed - as inflection or exhortation occurs.
Blank verse, as opposed to free verse, however, does have a dominant meter - most often the iambic pentameter noted above, but if you read aloud (as all poetry needs to be read to be heard), then as in speech, you will find an occasional emphatic three-syllable beat anapest (I'm a PEST, I'm a PEST) or contemplative dactyl {DAC ty lic, DAC tyl ic), or troche (two consecutive syllables either stressed or unstressed). Blank verse also works with a contemplative or meditative dactyl downbeat. The naming of the meter and beat is defined by the main thread that you hear and sense while reading aloud.
Blank verse is generally focused on an image and a journey in words to resolve the image. 
Blank verse does not have end rhymes AND the images conveyed are not ended in each line. The verse focuses on a longer, more detailed contemplation and ejambment carries through to the next line, to stop where the thought or image would naturally pause or end, while maintaining the rhythm into the next pentameter (using pentameter as an example (5 two syllable beats, for example, per line). Then, in the next 'line' you will find a stop in the form of a period or comma, before beginning the next thought. That's enjambment for you word sleuths 
Although there is not customarily end-rhyming in blank verse, internal rhyme - within a line or to tie together an enjambed thought - often serves to focus an image.
Rhythm and cadence is also conveyed in blank verse by use of assonance - repeated vowel sound within a line or enjambed image, and alliteration - repeated consonant sounds within said line or enjambed image.
Consider the following publications that from their guidelines would appear to welcome blank verse 
