Verse

by Sibyl

Read your verse out loud, with completely natural phrasing. Don’t try to make it fit the meter, just read it and see where the stresses naturally fall. (Remember, to write verse does not mean to lose the ability to make sense or to speak English.) If the verse doesn’t have a regular pattern (stresses every second or third syllable, most often), rewrite for a more satisfying thump.

Change: Happy birthday to you, guys
to: Happy birthday, guys, to you
Change: a castle is at the top of the hill
to: a castle stands tall at the top of the hill
or: at the top of the hill is a castle

Some variation in the regular stress pattern is likely: “Those of the largest size”, or “holding his pocket handkerchief”—in light verse, like ours, only once in a while. Don’t vary the pattern so that the line reads awkwardly. Don’t use two variations in a row—you’ll get prose.
Keep the same number of beats in each line. (Or alternate odd lines with even ones a stress shorter.)

Rhyme

Enigma verse almost always rhymes. Most common are couplets (aa bb), quatrains with alternately rhyming lines (abab), or quatrains with even-line rhyme only (abcb). Rhyme depends on stressed sounds (never on spelling) that match except for their first consonant (actually the first phoneme: all/fall).

These are rhymes: hard/card; word/deferred; doggerel/ hoggerel; or (see above) sympathize/size, using the secondary stress of the three-syllable word. These are not rhymes: card/diehard (LIE hard rhymes with DIE hard); howler/bowler (spelling doesn’t count); beaut/swimsuit (no “secondary stress” in a two-syllable word); male/female.

If you’re willing to read (aloud, of course) a lot of verse, you’ll write better stuff. If you’re willing to read just a little, try The New Oxford Book of Light Verse, edited by Kingsley Amis; or How to be Well-Versed in Poetry, edited by E. O. Parrott; or some other light-verse anthology. Or look in the library for verse by Dorothy Parker, W. H. Auden, Samuel Hoffenstein, Phyllis McGinley, Felicia Lamport, or someone else you like. Verse is to be enjoyed. Enjoy!

[Note: This article is taken as-is (other than minor formatting changes) from the Guide to the Enigma with gratitude to Sibyl]