Collected Poems - Sri Aurobindo Ashram

568 Pondicherry, c. 1927 – 1947
_
No
_
xe
_
st | pe
_
rpĕtŭ(a) | u
_
nă | do
_
rmĭ|e
ndă.*
But here the metre runs ⌣| | ⌣⌣| ⌣| ; a trochee
is transferred from the closing flow of trochees to the beginning
of the line, the spondee and dactyl are pushed into the
middle; the last syllable of the closing trochee is most often
dropped altogether. Classical metres cannot always with success
be taken over just as they are into the English rhythm; often
some modifications are needed to make them more malleable.
In “Moon of Two Hemispheres” the strophe antistrophe
system has been used: the lines of the stanza differ from each
other in the nature and order of the feet, no identity or approach
to identity is imposed; but each line of the antistrophe follows
scrupulously the arrangement of the corresponding line of the
strophe. An occasional modulation at most is allowed, e.g. the
substitution of a trochee for a spondee. The whole poem, however,
in spite of its metrical variations, follows a single general
rhythmic movement.
“Rose of God”, like a previous poem “In Horis Aeternum”,
is written in pure stress metre. As stress and high accentual
pitch usually coincide, it is possible to scan accentual metre
on the stress principle and stress metre also can be so written
that it can be scanned as accentual verse; but pure stress metre
depends entirely on stress ictus. In ordinary poetry stress and
natural syllabic quantity enter in as elements of the rhythm, but
are not, qua stress and quantity, essential elements of the basic
metre: in pure stress metre there is a reversal of these values;
quantity and accentual inflexion are subordinate and help to
build the rhythm, but stress alone determines the metrical basis.
In “Rose of God” each line is composed of six stresses, and the
whole poem is built of five stanzas, each containing four such
lines; the arrangement of feet varies freely to suit the movement
of thought and feeling in each line. Thus,
* Suns may set and come again;
For us, when once our brief light has set,
There is one perpetual night to be slept.
CATULLUS