1. Prosody
Understanding the meter of a poem to better understand and appreciate content

2. Meter A poem is metrical when we see
countable regularity through stressed/unstressed syllables AND
A regular line width

3. Foot
A poetic foot consists of one stressed syllable, usually accompanied by one or two unstressed syllables.

4. Types of feet and examples
Iambic: one unstressed syllable followed by one stressed syllable
EXAMPLE: The curfew tolls the knell of parting day

5. Anapestic Two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable
Example: Where the youth pined away with desire

6. Trochaic One stressed followed by one unstressed
Example: Once upon a midnight dreary

7. Dactylic One stressed followed by two unstressed
Example: This is the forest primeval, the murmuring pines and the hemlocks

8. Spondaic and pyrrhic (substitutions only in a poetic line)
Spondaic: Two equally stressed syllables
Example: Good strong thick stupefying incense smoke
Pyrrhic: Two equally unstressed syllables
Example: My way is to begin at the beginning

9. Line width
To count the number of feet per poetic line, pretend the foot is a musical beat.
TWO WAYS TO FIND OUT THE LINE WIDTH: 1. Clap the stressed syllables either aloud, or think them as you read.
2. Count the TOTAL number of syllables and divide by two or three, depending on the foot type. If the division is uneven, then you must revert to method #1.

10. Types of lines Monometer: one foot per line Dimeter: two feet per line
Trimeter: three feet per line
Tetrameter: four feet per line
Pentameter: five feet per line
Hexameter: six feet per line
Heptameter: seven feet per line
Octameter: eight feet per line

11. Example of counting width and foot type
Frost’s “The Road Not Taken” (I am capitalizing stressed syllables for ease of reading)
Two ROADS diVERGED in a YELlow WOOD,
And SORry I COULD not TRAvel BOTH
And BE one TRAVEler, LONG i STOOD
And LOOKED down ONE as FAR as i COULD
To WHERE it BENT in the UNdergGROWTH.