Double Dactyl

Our Host

Wendy Everard is a high school English teacher and writer living in central New York.  Her role as mother and teacher has given her plenty to write about since she started writing personal narrative and poetry, lifelong hobbies that were reignited when she joined a summer institute with the Seven Valleys branch of the National Writing Project a few years ago and began mentoring student teachers.  She teaches in Cazenovia, New York.

The Inspiration

I know that all might not, but I have a soft spot for metered poetry.  There’s something about having to make the sense fit the rhythm that is an irresistible challenge to me.  One type of meter that I don’t see a lot in poetic forms is the dactyl, and today I’m challenging you to try the Double Dactyl – it seems like a fun form with some whimsical “rules.”

“In 1951, with the help of editor Naomi Pascal and her husband, classics scholar Paul Pascal, poet Anthony Hecht devised a new type of poem with a focus on form. The double dactyl comprises two quatrains with the same meter. The first three lines each have six syllables, with stress on the first and fourth syllables. (A dactyl is a group of three syllables where the first is stressed, and the second two are unstressed. So each of these lines is technically a double dactyl, hence the name of this type of poem.) The last line of each stanza only includes the first four syllables of a double dactyl, so: one stressed, then two unstressed, then one stressed.”

(https://www.mentalfloss.com/posts/unusual-types-poems)

The Process

• The first line must be nonsense, often higgledy-piggledy or jiggery-pokery.  (See this link for some fun nonsense words!
• The second line must be someone’s name. (Again, it has to be a double dactyl, so not every six-syllable name works. Matthew McConaughey does; Kareem Abdul-Jabbar doesn’t.)  Need some help?  See here.  
• The last line of the first stanza must rhyme with the last line of the second.
• One of the six-syllable lines must be one word. This can be anywhere in the poem, but Hecht preferred it as the sixth line. (https://www.mentalfloss.com/posts/unusual-types-poems)

Happy Writing!

Wendy’s Poem

Blatherskite bafflegab!
Julie Roberts was
Prettiest Woman of
90s’s big screen

Identifiable
And undeniable
Cuddliest working girl
We’d ever seen

Gere was a match for her
Carried a torch for her
End of the movie saw
Her as his queen

Patrons flocked to the show
Packed in from row to row
Left the place, heard to moan:
“Where’s my prince been?”

Your Turn

Now, scroll to the comment section below to write your own poem. (This is a public space, so you may use only your first name or initials depending on your privacy preferences.) Not ready? That’s okay. Read the poems already posted for more inspiration. Ponder your own throughout the day. Return later. And, if the prompt does not work for you, that is fine. All writing is welcome. Just write something. Also, please be sure to respond to at least three writers. Oh, and a note about drafting: Since we are writing in short bursts, we all understand (and even welcome) the typos and partial poems that remind us we are human and that writing is always becoming. If you’d like to invite other teachers to write with us, tell them to subscribe.