Laurel · Poems by form and metre

Dactylic tetrameter

Four dactyls to the line, a stress then two light syllables. Below, what the metre is and how to recognise it, then every poem on Laurel measured as dactylic tetrameter, with how closely each keeps it.

What dactylic tetrameter is

Four beats to the line, a heavy syllable then two light ones: DUM-da-da four times, eleven or twelve syllables. Browning’s Lost Leader is in it.

DUM-da-da DUM-da-da DUM-da-da DUM-da-da

JUST for a HAND-ful of SIL-ver he LEFT us
Browning, The Lost Leader; the beats in capitals

How to tell

Lines that start heavy and waltz, four beats, ten to twelve syllables.

Paste a poem of your own and Laurel will say whether it is in dactylic tetrameter, stanza by stanza. How to scan a line.

37 poems on Laurel in dactylic tetrameter

  1. Song of Saul Before His Last Battle Lord Byron, The Giaour, and Other Poems
  2. Mesmerism Ezra Pound, Personae · 86%
  3. The Falling of the Leaves W. B. Yeats, Poems · 86%
  4. The Lost Leader Robert Browning, Selections from the Poems and Plays of Robert Browning
  5. Thou Gloomy December Robert Burns, Poems and Songs · 82%
  6. Christmas Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 96%
  7. Over the Hills Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 88%
  8. The Murdered Lover Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 86%
  9. The Valse Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 86%
  10. To the Road Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 83%
  11. Ode for Memorial Day Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 80%
  12. Phyllis Paul Laurence Dunbar, The Complete Poems · 74%
  13. The First Chantey Rudyard Kipling, Verses 1889–1896 · 83%
  14. The Going of the Battery Wives’ Lament Thomas Hardy, Poems of the Past and the Present
  15. The Voice Thomas Hardy, Satires of Circumstance, Lyrics and Reveries
  16. Separation Matthew Arnold, Poems · 82%
  17. Keepsake Mill Robert Louis Stevenson, A Child's Garden of Verses · 82%
  18. The Ballad of the Battle of Gibeon G. K. Chesterton, The Wild Knight and Other Poems · 82%
  19. On Suddenly Receiving a Curl Long Refused Vachel Lindsay, The Congo and Other Poems · 79%
  20. Corona Crucis Lionel Johnson, Poems
  21. My Soprano (H. L.) Louise Imogen Guiney, Songs at the Start · 86%
  22. Niagara Joseph Rodman Drake, The Culprit Fay and Other Poems · 83%
  23. England to Ireland (February 1888) William Watson, The Poems of William Watson · 78%
  24. On Being Removed from Hsün-Yang and Sent to Chung-Chou Various, A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems · 78%
  25. On the Way to Hangchow: Anchored on the River at Night Various, A Hundred and Seventy Chinese Poems · 78%
  26. Dactylics Henry Kirke White, The Poetical Works of Henry Kirke White · 77%
  27. Surf Edmund Clarence Stedman, The Blameless Prince, and Other Poems · 75%
  28. Frida Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Poems and Songs
  29. Lullaby Dorothy Parker, Enough Rope
  30. Nightfall in the City of Hyderabad Sarojini Naidu, The Golden Threshold
  31. Song Bjørnstjerne Bjørnson, Poems and Songs
  32. Song of the Little White Girl Katherine Mansfield, Poems
  33. The Bather Bliss Carman, More Songs from Vagabondia
  34. The Call to Evening Prayer Sarojini Naidu, The Bird of Time: Songs of Life, Death & the Spring
  35. The Flight into Egypt Henry Van Dyke, The Poems of Henry Van Dyke
  36. The Mother of Poets. To H. F. H Bliss Carman, More Songs from Vagabondia
  37. The Song of Iron IV Lola Ridge, The Ghetto, and Other Poems

Each poem's metre was measured from its own words by the method described here; the figure beside a poem is the share of its stressed syllables that fall on the beat. Forms are named from the rhyme scheme and line count together.