I touched on this earlier, I love to write, and it's all kinds of writing, from political, to science, to science fiction, to a series I'm working on, to short stories and poetry.

The short stories and poetry are about no one in particular, just my idealized musings.  So I figure I'd start by posting something I wrote recently and anyone who wants to add some of their own can add theirs in this thread.  The following was a poem I wrote yesterday (well now it's two days ago).  50 lines it took me about 90 minutes (between 8 AM and 9:30 AM) including the time it took to proofread and balance out all the syllables (I'm big on mathematical structure to poems, and all the rhyming lines have to have exactly the same number of syllables.)  I also employee different rhyming structures for variety.  Yeah once you learn all that, it seems like a lot of work, but I assure you it isn't.  I also love reading my writing out loud and singing it (if it's a song I wrote).
 
Your laughter is my caffeine
Being there is what I pretend
Seeing you smile like a queen
I wish the night would never end
You're the innocent bystander
Witness to my night time candor
As passions overflow
My feelings for you grow
My heart and mind closely compete
In a contest I cant complete
You're the unwitting prize
A gift of my demise
Lost in my own universe
Making it fully what I want it to be
The soundtrack played in reverse
Go back in time at last learn how to be free
Neutralize the evil curse
That my sad and sorry past put upon me
Walking through life with a happy beat in my heart
With bright vivid dreams that are sublime
Confident that I will no longer come apart
That I will completely heal with time
One more fiery flame to keep you warm
Embracing you with thoughts of me
A strong connection now begins to form
And our hearts and souls are set free
My love, you inspire me to be better
To fulfill all my dreams to the letter
Creating a conveyor belt of joy
Making a man out of this little boy
I care about you so much
A lot more than as a friend
I just wish that we could touch
So I could make your heart mend
I really like it when you fluster
You always give your feelings away
I love you is all I can muster
You know that I'm here and I will stay
When you want sweet I'll be your marmalade
And you can be my sugar queen
But if anyone throws you any shade
They'll get a heavy side of mean
A high and costly toll that must be paid
Don't worry I'll always fight clean
Because our lasting love will never fade
A closeness never before seen
This is how I'll prove it to you
That you can completely trust me
So you see my feelings are true
And real love is what this must be

 

I don't write myself, but I understand the fascination.  Kind of like a crossword or puzzle when you have a strict metre, right?  Writing is an art.  I've studied Latin, and through that understood how the Greek and Latin writers of antiquity perfected the art and laid the foundation of the European traditions.  Poetry of that time followed strict rules for rhythm mostly based on syllable length (somewhat adapted for the language - Latin had stress, but not Greek which was a tonal language).  The orators crafted their speeches with extreme care.  This tradition was kept alive through the middle ages and later, but seems to me to have faded somewhat, having been reduced to rhyming and fairly lax rhythm.  Of modern writers I think Carl Sagan is a good example of someone that knew the art of oratory, composing text similar to those of antiquity (one example, packed with oratory devices: Pale Blue Dot).  And an example of a writer who kept the old traditions of poetry alive could be Tolkien (one example, carefully picked words to fit metre and alliteration: Durin's song).

I don't write myself, but I understand the fascination.  Kind of like a crossword or puzzle when you have a strict metre, right?  Writing is an art.  I've studied Latin, and through that understood how the Greek and Latin writers of antiquity perfected the art and laid the foundation of the European traditions.  Poetry of that time followed strict rules for rhythm mostly based on syllable length (somewhat adapted for the language - Latin had stress, but not Greek which was a tonal language).  The orators crafted their speeches with extreme care.  This tradition was kept alive through the middle ages and later, but seems to me to have faded somewhat, having been reduced to rhyming and fairly lax rhythm.  Of modern writers I think Carl Sagan is a good example of someone that knew the art of oratory, composing text similar to those of antiquity (one example, packed with oratory devices: Pale Blue Dot).  And an example of a writer who kept the old traditions of poetry alive could be Tolkien (one example, carefully picked words to fit metre and alliteration: Durin's song).

Yes you understand perfectly, Mid, it's almost like a mathematical fascination for me because of rhythm and rhyme.  I think I picked it up when I started reading Tolkien as his poetry seems to have that kind of mathematical pattern to it.  The words become more like musical notes and I write more for the musical sounds of the words rather than for the meaning of the words themselves (although of course the sentences still have to make sense.)
Ah I just got to the end of your post and saw you mentioned Tolkien too (I was unaware of that when I first brought him up earlier in my response.)  Reading his poetry is what actually inspired me because of the way the words sound-- they have a musical rhythm to them and it makes me wonder if our brains are instinctively wired for this? Because I have to say that when I started treating words as musical notes (even just the syllables present in words), the sentences seemed to form automatically, without too much thought required (the most work was done in editing later to make sure the syllables all matched up.)

It's good to bring up Carl Sagan too, because although this doesn't seem to be what would be considered scientific, I think it may prove to be important in properly conveying the importance of science to the general public. Scientific communication is of the utmost importance (and seems to be in decline lately) so if there was someone like Sagan around I think the public would benefit greatly from his kind of communication skills.

 they have a musical rhythm to them and it makes me wonder if our brains are instinctively wired for this?

Stories and poetry began as an oral tradition.  Everything had to be learned by heart to be passed to the next generation.  And rhythm greatly helps this.  The Aeneid begins "arma uirumque cano", "I sing of war and the man", which probably doesn't mean that it went with a fixed melody, but there is a fixed rhythm which makes the text easier to memorise.  Perhaps poetry was indeed sung, but I think the melody was mostly improvised in that case.  In modern times rap music is perhaps a parallel.  Rhythm is important (but today much more flexible than poetry of antiquity).

Are our brains hardwired for music?  I definitely think so.  We like the rhythm.  It sets our mood.  It's the first thing humans hear, something we've heard since the womb.  It's no coincidence that anything outside 30 to 200 beats per minute doesn't work, which closely matches our heartbeat.  And the melody mimics our voices.  And there is harmony, or structures, patterns and symmetry, something our brains also are hardwired to recognise.  Sagan sent pieces of music with the Voyager probe, but it's likely that it would mean nothing to aliens with a different heartbeat or perhaps a totally different circulatory system, and adapted to a different frequency range.

 they have a musical rhythm to them and it makes me wonder if our brains are instinctively wired for this?

Stories and poetry began as an oral tradition.  Everything had to be learned by heart to be passed to the next generation.  And rhythm greatly helps this.  The Aeneid begins "arma uirumque cano", "I sing of war and the man", which probably doesn't mean that it went with a fixed melody, but there is a fixed rhythm which makes the text easier to memorise.  Perhaps poetry was indeed sung, but I think the melody was mostly improvised in that case.  In modern times rap music is perhaps a parallel.  Rhythm is important (but today much more flexible than poetry of antiquity).

Are our brains hardwired for music?  I definitely think so.  We like the rhythm.  It sets our mood.  It's the first thing humans hear, something we've heard since the womb.  It's no coincidence that anything outside 30 to 200 beats per minute doesn't work, which closely matches our heartbeat.  And the melody mimics our voices.  And there is harmony, or structures, patterns and symmetry, something our brains also are hardwired to recognise.  Sagan sent pieces of music with the Voyager probe, but it's likely that it would mean nothing to aliens with a different heartbeat or perhaps a totally different circulatory system, and adapted to a different frequency range.

I feel this too.  I'm not someone who carries a device with me everywhere I go.  Sometimes inspiration strikes me in transit and I have to memorize it so I can write it down later.  I find it surprisingly easy to memorize long rhymes (20 lines or more) because of the rhythm of the words.  It's as if the previous line helps in remembering the next one and so on.  There's a benefit to seeing patterns although sometimes patterns that our brains detect are artifacts, but it definitely is beneficial in a variety of applications.

I'm trying to figure out how to translate this 30-200 beats per minute into the number of syllables I put in each line, is there a direct translation of it?  For example would 20 syllables per line be too much?  I find shorter lines to be better although I've done as much as 24 per line that rhyme.

I've read translations of the Iliad and Odyssey.  My favorite translation of the Iliad is Alexander Pope's classic and that has a nice rhythm to it but none of the Odyssey translations I've seen seem to have have it (even Pope's.)  In the original Greek, they don't seem to have any rhythm at all....is that just because Greek has a fundamentally different structure and different kind of rhythm?

I also read a terza rima translation of Dante's classic Divine Comedy where the terza rima structure was preserved translating it to English and I liked its intricate rhyming structure too.

The idea of alien poetry is truly mind numbing, I wonder if we would even recognize it for what it was?

I've also read that "listening" to certain kinds of music aids in brain development even for fetus' in the womb-- I believe that.  But some have even said that plants can grow better if people sing to them or play certain kinds of music to them? I wonder if this is possible.  Plant intelligence and mycology networks seem to be very popular areas of research now so perhaps?

For example would 20 syllables per line be too much?

That depends, but up to 20-something should give a natural flow.

 In the original Greek, they don't seem to have any rhythm at all....is that just because Greek has a fundamentally different structure and different kind of rhythm?

It has very much rhythm.  It uses the dactylic hexameter, so does the Aeneid in Latin.  What it means is that each line has six feet, and each foot consists of a long and two short syllables (a dactyl), except the last which has two syllables and the first must be long (the last doesn't matter, since the end of the line marks the end of a word and a brief pause anyway).  So it basically goes like a waltz.  But in foot 1 - 4 the dactyl can be replaced by two long syllables (a spondee).  So a line will have between 13 and 17 syllables.  Greek and Latin follow the same rules, but ancient Greek did not have a stress accent, whereas Latin had, so Latin also added a rule that the long syllable in the fifth foot should match the natural stress of the word, since in Latin a long syllable attracts the stress.  This probably matters even more in English, giving a need to match the stress with the first syllable in most feet.  There are more rules and details, but to understand the rhythm don't count syllables, but think syllable length.  This worked great in Greek.  In English stressed vs unstressed is what matters.

For example would 20 syllables per line be too much?

That depends, but up to 20-something should give a natural flow.

 In the original Greek, they don't seem to have any rhythm at all....is that just because Greek has a fundamentally different structure and different kind of rhythm?

It has very much rhythm.  It uses the dactylic hexameter, so does the Aeneid in Latin.  What it means is that each line has six feet, and each foot consists of a long and two short syllables (a dactyl), except the last which has two syllables and the first must be long (the last doesn't matter, since the end of the line marks the end of a word and a brief pause anyway).  So it basically goes like a waltz.  But in foot 1 - 4 the dactyl can be replaced by two long syllables (a spondee).  So a line will have between 13 and 17 syllables.  Greek and Latin follow the same rules, but ancient Greek did not have a stress accent, whereas Latin had, so Latin also added a rule that the long syllable in the fifth foot should match the natural stress of the word, since in Latin a long syllable attracts the stress.  This probably matters even more in English, giving a need to match the stress with the first syllable in most feet.  There are more rules and details, but to understand the rhythm don't count syllables, but think syllable length.  This worked great in Greek.  In English stressed vs unstressed is what matters.

I see I remember reading it out loud and seeing there was a rhythm to it but it seemed so different from English poetry, almost alien in nature.  I wonder how they created such a complex (yet beautiful- like a slow dance) kind of structure?  I wonder if this system had its origin in an even more ancient Indo-European language (I think Sanskrit poetry has a similar structure, which is intriguing.)

I see I remember reading it out loud and seeing there was a rhythm to it but it seemed so different from English poetry, almost alien in nature.

What works best depends on the language.  So what works in Greek and Sanskrit might not work so well in other languages.  The Romans admired Greek literature and plays, and they imitated that when they began to write similar things in Latin, but since Greek and Latin are different languages, it only kind of worked.  Greek and Latin are similar in that the quantity (length) of the syllables matter (like in English there is a clear distinction between "bit" and "beat"), but ancient Greek is a pitch based language, whereas stress is important in Latin.  So because the Roman used a style made for Greek, Latin poetry gets a somewhat unnatural, distinct sound, but it appears that this style quickly got associated with poetry and became what good poetry was supposed to sound like.

Here's an example of what the Aeneid might have sounded like: http://youtube.com/watch?v=CmDfdnktMcI

It's of course difficult to know the proper intonation that was used.  This reading has a good compromise between the flow of the meter and natural emphasis based on the meaning to avoid a robot like performance.

I see I remember reading it out loud and seeing there was a rhythm to it but it seemed so different from English poetry, almost alien in nature.

What works best depends on the language.  So what works in Greek and Sanskrit might not work so well in other languages.  The Romans admired Greek literature and plays, and they imitated that when they began to write similar things in Latin, but since Greek and Latin are different languages, it only kind of worked.  Greek and Latin are similar in that the quantity (length) of the syllables matter (like in English there is a clear distinction between "bit" and "beat"), but ancient Greek is a pitch based language, whereas stress is important in Latin.  So because the Roman used a style made for Greek, Latin poetry gets a somewhat unnatural, distinct sound, but it appears that this style quickly got associated with poetry and became what good poetry was supposed to sound like.

Here's an example of what the Aeneid might have sounded like: http://youtube.com/watch?v=CmDfdnktMcI

It's of course difficult to know the proper intonation that was used.  This reading has a good compromise between the flow of the meter and natural emphasis based on the meaning to avoid a robot like performance.

Thanks Mid, I watched that video and it was quite useful to show the rhythm of poetry from that time period  I then went on to watch this one which gave some background on the Aeneid and Virgil.  It left me wondering if Virgil had fully completed it or intended to write more before he died?



Did the style make it all the down to Italian from the Renaissance period?  I remember when I read Dante's Divine Comedy I was very impressed with the terza rima structure to it.  All three books were perfectly written in this structure

It left me wondering if Virgil had fully completed it or intended to write more before he died?

According to tradition, Vergil intended to improve it.  I think the story itself was complete, but he probably wanted to improve some verses which didn't fit the metre well.

Did the style make it all the down to Italian from the Renaissance period?

Yes, Roman poetry was continuously read and admired, and the style served as a model, more or less accurately.  After the Roman period Latin gradually changed into the different Romance branches and fairly early the clear distinction between long and short vowels and consonants was lost in the spoken language, a distinction which is critical for Latin poetry to work.  So some authors didn't quite understand how the metre work, whereas others did, and hence the quality varied.  But no doubt there has been an unbroken tradition understanding how Latin poetry worked and how Romans of antiquity spoke, though new variants of spoken Latin evolved in different parts of Europe through the middle ages.

It left me wondering if Virgil had fully completed it or intended to write more before he died?

According to tradition, Vergil intended to improve it.  I think the story itself was complete, but he probably wanted to improve some verses which didn't fit the metre well.

Did the style make it all the down to Italian from the Renaissance period?

Yes, Roman poetry was continuously read and admired, and the style served as a model, more or less accurately.  After the Roman period Latin gradually changed into the different Romance branches and fairly early the clear distinction between long and short vowels and consonants was lost in the spoken language, a distinction which is critical for Latin poetry to work.  So some authors didn't quite understand how the metre work, whereas others did, and hence the quality varied.  But no doubt there has been an unbroken tradition understanding how Latin poetry worked and how Romans of antiquity spoke, though new variants of spoken Latin evolved in different parts of Europe through the middle ages.

It was amazing that he wanted to take the tradition of Homer and create a similar one for Rome.  He succeeded for the most part from what I could tell.  I always liked the Iliad the most but both the Odyssey and the Aeneid are right behind it in  my mind.  I also liked that the Aeneid was from the point of view of someone who fought on the side of Troy, as ancient history often seems to be one sided in its depictions of heroes and villains.
The only thing in that collection I wish for is that there was a fourth epic, like a prologue to the Iliad to describe in detail the first few years of the Trojan War as well as the events that led up to it.