Rhapsody On A Windy Night

The poem is written in free verse, which does not have a regular meter. Free verse doesn’t employ rhyme, although Eliot does make occasional use of it, such as with: “Remark the cat which flattens itself in the gutter, / Slips out its tongue / And devours a morsel of rancid butter” (Lines 35-37). This is known as a feminine rhyme because the final syllable is unstressed. Another example of feminine rhyme is “The street-lamp sputtered, / The street-lamp muttered” (Lines 14-15). Masculine rhymes, in contrast, end in stressed syllables. There are two examples in the poem: “‘Regard the moon, / La lune ne garde aucune rancune” (Lines 50-51) and “That smells of dust and eau de Cologne, / She is alone” (Lines 58-59).

The length of the lines varies widely. The longest is 16 syllables, and the shortest is just one—"Mount” (Line 75). A number of lines, especially those that mark the nighttime hour, have three syllables, such as “Half-past one” (Line 13). The majority of the lines consist of six to eight syllables. The meter is irregular throughout and cannot be classified in terms of traditional poetic feet.