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Train your ear to hear the meter
Published: May 27, 2005 To help you listen for metrical beats, try dividing the following poem into 10 lines of iambic pentameter. Remember, five strong stresses per line is what you're after; don't be distracted by commas and periods, which may or may not indicate the end of a line. After you finish, check the correct lineation below.
El Dia de los Muertos
In Mexico, I met myself one day along the side of someone's private road. I recognized the longing in my face. I felt the heavy burden of the load I carried. Mexico, I thought, was strange and very dry. The private road belonged to friends more powerful than I, enraged but noble people who like me sang songs in honor of the dead. In Mexico, tradition is as heavy as the sun.
--from "El Dia de los Muertos" by Rafael Campo
The Threepenny Review, 1995
Correct lineation:
In Mexico, I met myself one day
along the side of someone's private road.
I recognized the longing in my face.
I felt the heavy burden of the load
I carried. Mexico, I thought, was strange
and very dry. The private road belonged
to friends more powerful than I, enraged
but noble people who like me sang songs
in honor of the dead. In Mexico,
tradition is as heavy as the sun.
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