The London towers build up to the sky
On roads and motorways the cars travel.
Canarywharf is the tallest building
At night the lights all come on
The city buzz grows quiet
As people race home to sleep
The river thames glitters at night time
Theatres and restaurants bring people in
Hustle and bustle is everywhere
Fight your way through the crowds
Have a drink in the pub
Everyone is always racing around
Never a moment to stop and think
Even when quiet there's always a sound
After work friends all meet up for a drink
Oxford Street is manic all the crowds push and shove
Find your way on the tube, don't get lost
This is a beautiful city that many love
Never mind the problems and the cost.
Hi Annonomus
ReplyDeleteGood iambic lines although travEL doesn’t really work and neither does builDING (also, Canary Wharf isn’t a building...sorry to be pedantic). What happened to the trochaic lines – they aren’t trochaic? The dactylic lines have a good natural rhythm though two of them end up with nine not eight syllables. The anapaestic lines also work well and I really like the way they repeat normal sounding speech that’s relevant to the mood of the poem AND fits in perfectly with the metrical requirements – really well done. The iambic quatrain, if you read it out to yourself, is rarely iambic though the last line is more so. The metre is getting a bit strained in the final quatrain but the rhymes, sense and again the use of regular speech phrases work quite well, though you might want to look at bits like ‘is maNIC’ which is what the metre requires but doesn’t really work at all. Overall a really good effort though, well done!
Anjali
Exercise 1:
ReplyDeleteLine 1 is perfect, but, as paper scissors stone says, Line 2 ends with a trochee. Also, Line 3 seems to end with 2 trochees. Come and find me in the week if you want me to explain iambs any more fully, as you will need to be confident with them for Task 19...
Exercise 2:
I share paper scissors stone's concerns about your trochees. This is, in my opinion, the hardest foot - but you are a way off here.
Exercise 3:
Your third line here is spot on! Well done! See if you can tinker with Lines 1 and 2 to reach that high quality?
Exercise 4: Perfect! :)
Exercise 5: The iambs are giving you trouble here. What you have written, to me, stresses as follows:
EV-ry-one IS-al-ways RAC-ing-a ROUND
NE-ver-a MO-ment-to STOP-and THINK
EV-en-when QUI-et-there's AL-ways-a SOUND
af-ter-WORK FRIENDS all-MEET up-FOR a-DRINK
As I say, come and find me one lunchtime and we'll go over iambic rhythm...
Exercise 6: Line 2 is perfect. If you can work out WHY, you should be able to apply the same magic to the other three - especially since you mastered anapests so brilliantly in Exercise 4...
Well done, annonomous. Keep up this fantastic effort! :)