Ferrick Gray
for Poetry Showcase
An essay (poem) written in heroic couplets requires that certain formatting be followed. However, it can be difficult to render the formatting in a web environment.
Due to the length of this form of poem, it is necessary to use line numbers. Depending on the length, line numbers appear in steps of five or ten. Shorter poems using heroic couplets do not require the use of line numbers.
Ferrick Gray
The Yellowed Page
Volume 2, Issue 10
Much of this essay has appeared in “Tradition: What Happened to Poetry?”, but it is included here with some minor additions for the completion of the summaries for Murry’s lectures delivered at Oxford in 1921. A lot of what Murry has to say is still relevant today, over one hundred years later. In many ways, it appears that the progress of poetry has not changed. Even today, its appeal is minimal, and it is not well received by the public, more so for formal poetry. However, some consider vers libre the savior of poetry, but it is far from this even though it is more popular.
From Eliot’s “The Family Reunion”
Ferrick Gray
Working with Eliot
Volume 1, Issue 2
The Family Reunion is a play written by T. S. Eliot. It was published and first performed in 1939. Eliot’s play had three unusual aspects to it, things we would not normally expect to find today. These are:
It is the appearance of the Eumenides that I will be considering in this essay; its purpose, use and effect on the play and connected characters. This essay is a small part of my full review which will appear on xiv lines later.
Kenneth Daniel Wisseman
Poetically Speaking
Volume 2, Issue 12
Byron, without question, is my favorite poet. He created perhaps some of the most well-known love poems of all time. Today I will write about one of my—if not my favorite poems of his and analyze the brilliant meter found in this lovely poem, a meter that I find perhaps the most beautiful I have ever discovered; and one that does not appear again until much later in another poet’s work (who I admire), Robert Frost. Frost employed the same foot at the end of his pentameter lines, which Byron used throughout this poem, made up of mostly dimeter lines. The unique form of foot both poets made great use of has been termed anapestic feminine endings or anapests at the end of lines with an extra syllable. It is a poem that inspired my unique style of poetry more so than any other poem. This poem shows Byron’s unique way of creating emotive lines by changing his meter at key emotional moments. Both Byron and Poe made great use of this effect, and both made great use of anapestic feet, which give a certain melodic ring to poetry, and this poem is full of anapests, as are many of my lyrical poems.