Sounds in Poetry

Poetrylaureates defines here the use of sounds in poetry.

Overview

In poetry, sound-patterning is a feature of the great majority of poems, and only in the last few centuries have readers become accustomed to silently reading a printed text. Poems were previously written for performance, and only committed to print subsequently, if at all. Poetry also derived from oral traditions, most spectacularly in the case of Homer, but continuing today in many less literate societies. The reason is not purely an accident of history, the growth of the printing press and universal education. Poems operate on many levels, and will fail if those levels are not addressed. Poetrylaureates advises you to integrate sound patterns in your poetry compositions. As noted, in our poetry contest and writing contest, we use sounds and imagery as key decision factors

We know, to begin with, that the brain is a complicated instrument which digests and acts on information by a variety of complex and inter-linked processes. At its simplest, the left hemisphere (in right-handed people) attends to the literal sense, while the right is more intuitive. Logic is a therefore left-brain activity, and music a right-brained activity. The distinction should not be overdone: no human activity is limited to one hemisphere, and even the most elementary operations involve levels deeper than the cerebellum. But the common view that poetry is as more concerned with how than with what is said, does contain an element of truth. In ordinary listening we respond to the speaker's intention without attending overmuch to their shape and presentation. In poetry, however, with its double code, both sound and sense are important, and the two are processed on different and not necessarily parallel tracks. Psychoacoustics distinguishes a speech from a non-speech mode, and finds that not only is coding very complex in both modes but signals in one mode can cue the other.

And perhaps that explains differences between the music of instruments and of poetry. They are not the same. The poverty of language often obliges us to call a voice soft or harsh, and no doubt we fancy that the vowels produced deep in the back of the mouth correspond to the larger woodwind instruments, etc. But such knowledge as we possess on these matters, which is still very sketchy, nevertheless shows that the appeals of poetry and music operate by very different mechanisms. Not all poets have been good musicians, nor those necessarily with the keenest ear. However the effort is worth it - Poetrylaureates believes that strong emotions and moods create 90% of the poem and of poetry and creative writing as an art form

Do sounds possess intrinsic meanings? The Symbolists fondly imagined so, and the attachment of words to their signified can be reinforced or reawakened by onomatopoeia and kinaesthesia. But what attachments do individual words posses? Deconstructionists view language as a self-referencing code, in which words have no final attachments to the world outside. However overstated, the theory stresses an obvious point. Words gain meanings in context. If sounds are to have inherent meanings, therefore, they will achieve those in the context of other sounds. Given that poems are not freestanding creations but express cultural and literary understandings, any intrinsic meanings of sound will also involve a larger matrix, from which they are not easily extracted.

Nonetheless, some research has been possible. Just as different languages use common features to carve up the world in generally similar ways (even though the languages are physically and historically isolated), so there appear certain parallels in the ways sound is employed in the very different literatures of the world. Even beyond poetry, sound evokes similar associations in widely different cultures, and to some extent necessarily, since human beings have common behaviours and vocal equipment.


Again, there are dangers of oversimplifying matters. Oriental languages are often tonal, and this makes for difficulties in translation, since oriental poetry extensively exploits a feature missing from English. Even within the European languages there are differences in the ways certain sounds will register. The Romance languages are generally fluid and employ open vowels, whereas the Germanic languages are markedly stressed, and make more use of consonant clusters. When, for example, Val¨¦ry writes L' insecte net gratte la s¨¦cheresse (line 68 of Le Cimiti¨¨re), the dentals and sibilants used to convey the parched landscapes of the Mediterranean summer are much more evident to a French ear than they are to ours.

And that brings us to an essential point. It is not sound in any general sense which is important, but how sound is used in a particular poem. Contemporary poets generally shun any music of verse, even if that means producing work not markedly different from everyday speech. That is their prerogative, and the matter is not to be settled on abstract bases, but to what uses sound can be put, on the gains and the losses, which can be very varied.

Introduction

Sound underlies those terms which schoolchildren were once tortured with alliteration, assonance, euphony, rhyme, pararhyme, onomatopoeia, repetition and tone colour. Moreover, in England at least, sound makes oblique reference to class attitudes and allegiances. The greatest poets Homer, Virgil, Du Fu, Rumi, Shakespeare, Racine, etc., who are  supreme by virtue of their humanity were also masters of the intricate deployment of sound, and had to be: sound is part and parcel of a poem's content.

Arguments arise over three aspects. First we have to note that writers (and indeed readers) vary very considerably as to whether they predominantly verbalize or visualize. The two faculties are not entirely separate, but where Byron tends towards graphic images, Keats gains his effects by incantatory sound. Second is the question of how consciously or deliberately poets create their sound effects. In our poetry contest and writing contest entries, the best poems use specific sound effects. Val¨¦ry could spend days seeking a word with the required vowels, consonants and number of syllables, but Shakespeare wrote much too rapidly for that valetudinarian care. Both are great writers, however, so that there is nothing gained by making rules from personal preferences. Third is the effect on the reader. Overuse of certain devices will create artificial work: alliteration in Lilly, Poe, and Swinburne. Nonetheless, it is not the device as such, but its use in too strident a way, or its use to the exclusion of other devices, which causes the problem, which literary tact eventually corrects.

We have also to acknowledge that sound is a pleasure, and something innate in human beings. We like to sing, and chants that approach song are moving and socially cohesive: the King James' Version and street demonstrations. Poetry is more readily put to music than prose, and even pop music employs poetic devices. Poetry may indeed slide into music, though the first makes more use of articulation and phonetic timbre and the second of pitch and duration. Repetition is instinctive, moreover: dada and mama gurgles the baby. Mnemonic devices are most effective when sound reinforces the sense. The texture of poetry may reflect the physical characteristics of their author's voice. And so on.

Sound is used for various ends in poetry, and these are often grouped under structure and texture. To the first belong rhyme, metre, arrangement of internal pauses, all of which come in a multitude of patterns dictated by literary tradition and properties of the language itself. The texture of sound is subtler and more important, at least to modern ears. It goes well beyond any simple characterization by recurring consonants or vowels, or predominantly as liquid or harsh, bright or sombre. In fact, both structure and texture can be classified further under headings of formal structure, sense, scene, feelings and aesthetics. 

Contemporary Use

Deliberate use of sound is far from dead, even among poets who dislike academia and the tightly constructed poetry it advocates. Allen Ginsberg, Robert Creely and Charles Wright {1}, to mention but three, aim at fluid, open forms that reflect the contemporary American scene. Yet if we look at their poetry, we find their most celebrated lines are successful to the extent they deploy the devices we have touched on.

Passages: Oct 1 by Robert Duncan

The bird's leap upward to flight towards the heart

(Punctuation by repeated d, t and p sound; expressive mime of repeated to.)

Wings Lifted over the Black Pit by Allen Ginsberg

Smoke & Steam, broken glass & beer cans,
Auto exhaust.

(Repeated s and t sounds used in an abstract pattern to symbolize the sense.)

Southern Cross by Charles Wright

Nightwind by now in the olive trees
No sound but the wind from anything.

(Not only tone painting with nasal n and v, but the involved interconnections in the repeated in, nd, ee sounds, superb in the second line.)

Detailed Examples

Emphasis: words or images
For Hades' b o bb in b ound in m u mm y cloth
(2. W.B. Yeats. Byzantium .)

M aster of beau t y, c rafts m an of the snowfla k e,
Ini m i t able c on t river,
(2. John Berryman. Eleven Addresses to the Lord .)

And the mussel p ooled and the heron
P riested shore
(2. Dylan Thomas . Poem in October .)

Indirect support of argument by related echoes
I s it a trick or a try sting place,
I s it a mir age or mir acle,
(2. Philip Larkin. XXVII )

Comes home d ull with coal d ust to d eliberately
Grime the sink¡­
(3. Ted Hughes. Her Husband .)

It was a flowering and a laying w aste
¡ª Man's skills found shining at the heart of woman,
His vengeance too, expediently unl aced .
(3. Carol Rumens. The Freedom Won by War for Women .)

Counterpoising: opposes or distracts from verse structure
And i r idescent cr eature
Batter against the b r illiance, d r op like a glove
To the hard floor, or the des k top .
(3. Richard Wilber. The Writer .)

The woman in the block of ivory soap
Has massive th ighs that n eigh ,
Great breasts that bl are and strong arms that trumpet.
(2. Marge Piercy. The Woman in the Ordinary .)

He too k no su ck when shoo k buds sing together
But he is c ome in c old as wor k house weather
(2. John Short. Carol .)

Interconnection: sound, meaning and feeling.
The way the shy st ars go st u tt ering on¡­
S lurs its s oft wax, fla tt er s .
(4. Carol Ann Duffy. The Grammar of Light .)

Their distant husbands l ean across m ahogany
And de l icate l y m anipulate the m arket
(2. Elma Mitchell. Thoughts after Ruskin .)

And d ea r e r , water, than ever your voice, as if
G la d ¡ª though g oo d ness knows why ¡ª to run with the human r ace,
(2. W.H. Auden. Streams .)

Abstract patterning: emphasizing content
Knowing not how shrewdly the rod
Woul d bi te the b ack in the king dom of the d ead God.
(3. Howard Nemerov. The Death of God .)

Help us out in Viet n a m
Batm a n
Help us drop that BatN apal m
(2. Adrian Henri. BatPoem .)

I am a young exe c utive No c uffs than mine are c leaner.
(2. John Betjeman. The Executive .)

Onomatopoeia: representation by sound.
I lay in an agony of imaginatio n as the wind¡­
Sn u ff led th rough fl oorboards f rom the f oundatio ns .
(2. Peter Redgrove. Old House )

G rumbling on the stairs
Over an old g rammar¡­
The som n amb ulist b rook.
(3. Elizabeth Bishop. A Summer's Dream .)

I hear am ong the f ur ze the m urm ur
Of inn um erable wasps.
(3. Robert Conquest. To be a Pilgrim .)

Illustrative Mime: mouth movements evoke motion or shape

The t ow elled head next, the h uge bact rach ian m out h:
(2. Charles Tomlinson. Charlotte Corday .)

I am Ra ft ery, he s i t an t and con f u s ed among
(2. Derek Mahon. I am Raftery .)

If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling f ro m the f ro th c or rupted lungs.
(2. Wilfred Own. Dulce et Decorum Est .)

Illustrative Painting : patterns correspond to non acoustic elements.

W hatever w ent wrong, that w eek, was more than w eather:
(2. Amy Clampit. A Hairline Fracture .)

I was born in Bri st ol , and it is po ss ible
To live har sh ly in that c ity.
(3. C.H. Sisons. Family Fortunes .)

How l ou d and above what
Furious spaces of fire do the distracting devils
O rgy and hosanna ,
(2. Ted Hughes. Thrushes.)

Passionate Emphasis

Forever asla nt in their m o m e nt and the m ind's eye.
(3. Anthony Hecht. The Cost .)

L amb of the shepherds, Chi l d, how sti ll you l ie.
(3. Robert Lowell. The Holy Innocents.)

C ousin, it's of you I always dream
As I walk these dis l o c ated l awns
(2. Jane Cooper. C. in a mental hospital .)

Mood Evocation

S a t ed upon the st illne ss of the bride.
(3. Geoffrey Hill. A Short History of British India .)

Ag ai n de cei ved, I found
P eac e in the c e r e monial l ove of w ealth ,
(5. Wesley Trimpi. Oedipus to the Oracle.)

The gai ety of three winds is a ga me of gree n
Sh ining, of gray -and- g old pl ay in the holly-bu sh
(5. W.S. Merwin. White Goat, White Ram.)

Expressive Mine: mouth movements evoke the emotion

Lark drives invisible pitons in the air
And h au ls itself up the f ace of sp ace .
(3. Norman MacCaig. Movements.)

S ome must employ the s c yth e
Upon the gra sses
(5. Philip Larkin. The Dedicated .)

O h leave his b o dy br o ken o n the r o cks
(5. William Bell. On a Dying Boy .)

Expressive Painting

All year the f lax-damn f e st ered in the hear t
Of the townland;
(3. Seamus Heaney. Death of a Naturalist .)

Now win t er d owns the d ying of the year
And night is all a s e tt lement of s now
(5. Richard Wilber. Years-End .)

And caught in the sn are of the b leeding air
The b utcher b ird si ng s, si ng s, si ng s.
(5. Charles Causley. Recruiting Drive .)

Ebullience

But she, ex iled, ex pelled, ex- queen,
Swishes among the men of science.
(6. Fleur Adcock. The Ex-Queen among the Astronomers .)

It m ay be at mi dday, l im ou si nes in c itie s, the groaning
D erric k and hi ss ing haw s er alive at dockyards,
Liners crawling with he at-baked d eck s, their ¨¦l ite
(6. Edwin Morgan. Stanzas of the Jeopardy .)

Shipw r ecked, the s un si nks down harbours
Of a sky, un l oads its li quid cargoes
Of ma r igolds,
(6. Dannie Abse. Epithalamion .)

The heat-ha z e dan c es m eadow s weet and m ay,
Whole cliffs colla ps e,
(6. Andrew Motion. The Lines .)

Embellishment

Clouds are flowering
Blue and mystical over the face of stars.
(6. Sylvia Plath. The Moon and the Yew Tree .)

and a w i nter when every st i ck of t i mber ¡ª
the yard's so dd en, ine di ble d riftwood, the fence-posts
(6. Duncan Bush. Pig Farmer .)

F ish gnaw the Fl ushing capons, hauled from fl eeced
L utheran Ho ll and, for tomorrow's f east.
(6. Tony Harrison. The Nuptial Torches .)

Bi tten and b urned i nto m i rrors of th i n gold,
The weathercocks, bli nd from the weather,
(6. Charles Tomlinson. The Weathercocks .)


Incantation

Time pa ss ing, and the mem ories of love
C oming back to me c ari ss i m a, no more m ockingly
Than ever before; time pa ss ing, un s la ck ening
(6. Donald Davie. Time Passing, Beloved .)

The la t e, re t arding and un s e tt led s ea s on
Works in the air with a di st rac t ing aim,
(6. Charles Gullens. Autumn. An Ode .)

Ag ai nst the fl ar e and d esc ant of the g as
I heard an old woman in a shop m ai nt ai n
(5. John Holloway. Warning to a Ghost .)

Mother, I went to China this morning.
The trees were p ago das, the pu ddles were seas.
Dra gon s were hiding behind the b ego nias.
(5. Alastair Reed. Who can Say .)

Some Suggestions

The list has been a long one, but is doubtless incomplete and somewhat arbitrary. What can we conclude? Perhaps the following:

1. Effects may not be consciously sought by the poet, or not initially, but they do help to explain the unexpected pleasure of the lines.

2. Once recognized, the effects can be developed, just as a composer develops a musical phrase by the laws of harmony.

3. Far more telling is their effect on the poem as a whole, the effect they create or fail to create