Meter

Meter: The regular rhythmic pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of verse.

Meter gives a poem a pulse the poet can then confirm or break; the departures from the pattern carry as much meaning as the pattern itself.

Meter examples

• "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (iambic pentameter)"

  — Sonnet 18, Shakespeare

• "Once upon a midnight dreary (trochaic)."

  — The Raven, Edgar Allan Poe

• "Two households, both alike in dignity, / In fair Verona, where we lay our scene,"

  — Romeo and Juliet, Shakespeare

• "Tyger Tyger, burning bright, / In the forests of the night;"

  — The Tyger, William Blake

• "I wandered lonely as a cloud / That floats on high o'er vales and hills,"

  — I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud, William Wordsworth

• "Half a league, half a league, / Half a league onward,"

  — The Charge of the Light Brigade, Alfred, Lord Tennyson

Want a full walkthrough? Read our long-form guide: Meter examples, explained.

Try it on your own writing: Meter Checker - scan your own lines · Syllable Counter

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