Poetry in Performance:

Sound

Reading and performing poems in public.

Daniel Nester, The College of Saint Rose, 2006-2015

“The lyric poem walks the line between speaking

and singing. (It also walks the line between the

conventions of poetry and the conventions of

grammar.) Poetry is not speech exactly—verbal

art is deliberately different than the way that

people actually talk—and yet it is always in

relationship to speech, to the spoken word.”

—Edward Hirsch, from How to Read a Poem

When you have a poem for performance, read it

aloud. Listen to it.

Does it have a rhythm?

What does the language sound like?

Are there rhymes, similar sounds?

Let’s talk about the way the poem sounds.

Can you pick up any alliteration?

Alliteration: the initial sounds of a word,

beginning either with a consonant or a vowel, are

repeated in close succession.

Alliteration: the initial sounds of a word,

beginning either with a consonant or a vowel, are

repeated in close succession.

Examples:

banked fires blaze

Nate never knows

Peter Piper picked a peck of pickles

Perfected poem, powerful punchlines

Pummeling petty powder puffs in my prime

Quite quaint quotes keep quiet it’s Quannum

Quarrelers ain't got a quarter of what we got, uh

Really raw raps, risin up rapidly

Riding the rushing radioactivity

—Blackalicious, “Alphabet Aerobics”

Did you pick up any assonance?

Assonance: the vowel sound(s) within a word

that matches the same sound in a nearby word or

words, but the surrounding consonant sounds are

different.

Assonance: vowel sound within a word matches the same sound in a nearby word, but the surrounding consonant sounds are different. Examples:

then with cracked hands that achedfrom labor in the weekday weather madebanked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

Oh, there goes Rabbit, he choked

He’s so mad, but he won’t give up that easy, no

He won’t have it, he knows his whole back’s to these ropes

It don't matter, he’s dope

He knows that, but he’s broke

He’s so stagnant that he knows

When he goes back to his mobile home,

That’s when it’s back to the lab again yo

Did you pick up or hear any rhyme?

Rhyme: correspondence of sound between

words or the endings of words, especially when

these are used at the ends of lines of poetry.

“Pick up” means hear—do not just look at the

words for similar word structures.

Rhyme means “sound alike,” and it’s not always

at the end of a line. Not in free verse, to be sure,

as well as received forms.

Example:

who had driven out the cold

and polished my good shoes as well.

What did I know, what did I know

of love’s austere and lonely offices?

Near-rhyme—also called slant rhyme, off-

rhyme, imperfect rhyme, feminine rhyme. The

sounds are similar, but not exact.

Examples: home and come; close and lose.

Perfect rhyme—exact correspondence in vowel

and consonant sound.

Examples: skylight and highlight; believe and

bereave

Many forms, like sonnets, have rhyme schemes.

Here’s an example.

Many forms like sonnets have rhyme schemes.

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun,Coral is far more red, than her lips red,If snow be white, why then her breasts are dun:If hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head:I have seen roses damasked, red and white,But no such roses see I in her cheeks,And in some perfumes is there more delight,Than in the breath that from my mistress reeks.I love to hear her speak, yet well I know,That music hath a far more pleasing sound:I grant I never saw a goddess go,My mistress when she walks treads on the ground.And yet by heaven I think my love as rare,As any she belied with false compare.

—William Shakespeare, Sonnet 130

Forms, like sonnets have rhyme schemes

My mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun, ACoral is far more red, than her lips red, BIf snow be white, why then her breasts are dun: AIf hairs be wires, black wires grow on her head: BI have seen roses damasked, red and white, CBut no such roses see I in her cheeks, D And in some perfumes is there more delight, CThan in the breath that from my mistress reeks. DI love to hear her speak, yet well I know, EThat music hath a far more pleasing sound: FI grant I never saw a goddess go, EMy mistress when she walks treads on the ground. FAnd yet by heaven I think my love as rare, GAs any she belied with false compare. G

Rhymes are fun to play with.

Skeltonic verse, also tumbling verse. Strickly

defined as verses with two or three stresses

arranged sometimes in falling and sometimes in

rising rhythm, it also refers to more than three

rhymes in a row.

An example of Skeltonic verse from the man himself:

Tell you I chyll,

If that ye wyll

A whyle be styll,

of a comely gyll

That dwelt on a hyll:

But she is not gryll,

For she is somewhat sage

And well worne in age;

for her visage

It would aswage

A mannes courage.

—John Skelton, “The Tunnyng of Elynour Rummyng”

Skeltonic verse: more than three rhymes in a row

She thought my name was Barry, I told her it was Gary

She said she didn't like it so she chose to call me Barry

She said she’d love to marry, my baby she would carry

And if she had a baby, she’d name the baby Harry

Her mother’s name is Baby, which is really quite contrary

Her face is very hairy, and you can say it’s scary

So isn’t not every, her father’s a fairy

His job is secretary, in some military

He throws them to an electric camp that wasn't voluntary

His daughter's name is Sherry, his sons are Tom and Jerry

Jerry had the flu but it was only temporary

Back in January, or was it February?

But every time I say this rhyme it makes me kinda weary

It’s only customary to give this commentary

—from “Roxanne Roxanne” by UTFO

Rhymes do not always appear at the end of

words.

who had driven out the cold

and polished my good shoes as well.

What did I know, what did I know

of love’s austere and lonely offices?

No sounds are random sounds in a poem. Pay

attention to your ear, your mouth’s shapes, as

you read a poem aloud.

Queen-Anne’s-Lace

Her body is not so white as

anemone petals nor so smooth—nor

so remote a thing. It is a field

of the wild carrot taking

the field by force; the grass

does not raise above it.

Here is no question of whiteness,

white as can be, with a purple mole

at the center of each flower.

Each flower is a hand’s span

of her whiteness. Wherever

his hand has lain there is

a tiny purple blemish. Each part

is a blossom under his touch

to which the fibres of her being

stem one by one, each to its end,

until the whole field is a

white desire, empty, a single stem,

a cluster, flower by flower,

a pious wish to whiteness gone over—or nothing.

William Carlos Williams, c. 1921

Queen-Anne’s-Lace

Her body is not so white as

anemone petals nor so smooth—nor

so remote a thing. It is a field

of the wild carrot taking

the field by force; the grass

does not raise above it.

Here is no question of whiteness,

white as can be, with a purple mole

at the center of each flower.

Each flower is a hand’s span

of her whiteness. Wherever

his hand has lain there is

a tiny purple blemish. Each part

is a blossom under his touch

to which the fibres of her being

stem one by one, each to its end,

until the whole field is a

white desire, empty, a single stem,

a cluster, flower by flower,

a pious wish to whiteness gone over—or nothing.

William Carlos Williams, c. 1921