Companion to the Thread "On Meter"

[Angeline]

First off, I would agree with Waeponwifestre that a song is not a poem, nor is a single line in isolation necessarily representative of a poem in total. But having said that, I'll go ahead and treat the line as if it were characteristic of a complete poem. Start with marking what you are pretty sure are stressed syllables:

​

Lu·cy in the sky with dia·monds​

Note that the last syllable of "Lucy" and the next two syllables "in the" are all normally unstressed or lightly stressed syllables, so by promotion, one would increase the stress on the middle syllable of the three ("in") for intelligibility, leaving

​

Lu·cy in the sky with dia·monds​

Now you have consistently alternating stressed and unstressed syllables, beginning with a stressed syllable, so marking the feet gives you

​

Lu·cy / in the / sky with / dia·monds​

which is trochaic tetrameter.

At least that's how I would analyze it.

So my original thought (trochaic tetrameter) was right! But how did you decide that "in" gets promoted to a stressed syllable and that "in the sky" is not an anapest? Is it just how you hear it? When I think of that line, which obviously I've heard many times, I do hear an emphasis on "in." I have to keep reminding myself it's not an exact science!

 

[Tzara]

So my original thought (trochaic tetrameter) was right! But how did you decide that "in" gets promoted to a stressed syllable and that "in the sky" is not an anapest? Is it just how you hear it? When I think of that line, which obviously I've heard many times, I do hear an emphasis on "in." I have to keep reminding myself it's not an exact science!

Probably "how I hear it" has a lot to do with it and the rest is justification backing that up. But look at what you get if you assume "in the sky" is an anapest:

​

Lu·cy / in the sky / with dia·monds​

A trochee, an anapest, and an amphibrach—no metrical consistency at all. You could find a little consistency by marking it this way:

​

Lu·cy / in the / sky with / dia·monds​

which would make it trochaic tetrameter with a pyrrhic substitution in the second foot, but you still have the problem of the three unstressed syllables in a row. Because of this, I doubt a pyrrhic substitution would ever follow a trochee (or, worse, a dactyl). Mary Oliver states categorically that a pyrrhic foot "occurs only when immediately followed by a spondee" (27), which isn't the case here.

I think the main thing is metrical consistency. Substitutions and elisions and whatnot occur, but relatively rarely. If a poem seems difficult to fit into a particular metrical pattern, it's probably in free verse.

Of course, you could consider it to be simply accentual verse, where only the stressed syllables matter. I think that's probably closer to how it sounds when sung, but again, a song is not a poem and you wouldn't analyze it the same way.

 

[Angeline]

Probably "how I hear it" has a lot to do with it and the rest is justification backing that up. But look at what you get if you assume "in the sky" is an anapest:

​

Lu·cy / in the sky / with dia·monds​

A trochee, an anapest, and an amphibrach—no metrical consistency at all. You could find a little consistency by marking it this way:

​

Lu·cy / in the / sky with / dia·monds​

which would make it trochaic tetrameter with a pyrrhic substitution in the second foot, but you still have the problem of the three unstressed syllables in a row. Because of this, I doubt a pyrrhic substitution would ever follow a trochee (or, worse, a dactyl). Mary Oliver states categorically that a pyrrhic foot "occurs only when immediately followed by a spondee" (27), which isn't the case here.

I think the main thing is metrical consistency. Substitutions and elisions and whatnot occur, but relatively rarely. If a poem seems difficult to fit into a particular metrical pattern, it's probably in free verse.

Of course, you could consider it to be simply accentual verse, where only the stressed syllables matter. I think that's probably closer to how it sounds when sung, but again, a song is not a poem and you wouldn't analyze it the same way.

Thanks Tzara. This is very helpful. With each explanation I understand a little more.