一直以來我有一個困惑，英文的詩，既不對仗，也不一定押韻，句數詞數也好像無甚規律，為什麼要叫做詩，而不是散文？
當然了，英文的散文有專門的詞(prose), 那必然是和詩(poem)有本質區別的。只不過我上過的英語課，都沒教我如何鑑賞英語文學作品，我如何知道英文詩的規則？這就像如果語文課沒有古文詩詞，我現在未必能知道甚麼是平仄對仗，未必能知道詞語背後的隱喻典故，甚至未必能知道幾首詩。
所以，別看我的英語在中國能過六級，為留學考的托福雅思名列前茅，在美國也順利生活了十幾年，但論文化程度，我的英文可能比不上美國的一個小學生。
為了讓我的英文文化不再接近文盲，我決定好好了解一下如何讀英文詩。
直接看詩歌集是沒有用的，因為我根本看不懂——即便每個單詞我都懂，也不知道如何欣賞。畢竟中文的詩詞，我也是經過了中學的無數考試的磨練，才能寫個高分的析意。對英文詩，我又不是天才，怎麼可能光看看就能看懂？
單純的介紹英文詩規則的書，我又看不下去，實在是太枯燥了。於是後來，我直接在Udemy找了個英文詩寫作的入門課程，學著寫了一堆的詩。這水平呢，大概和我小學時寫的中文詩差不多吧？好處是，我也終於記下了一些重要的規則。
英文詩裡，比押韻更重要的規則，是一個有點類似於平仄的東西，Meter (韻律), 硬翻譯的話大概是輕重音。主要有下面幾種：
- Iambic: unstress-stress
- e.g. To strive, to seek, to find, and not to yield.
- Trochaic: Stress-unstress
- Who is/knocking/at the/door
- Dactylic: stressed-unstressed-unstressed
- e.g. Can we go/shopping I/need some new/shoes today
- Anapestic: unstressed-unstressed-stressed
- e.g. I must fin/ish my jour/ney alone
- Spondee: stressed-stressed
多個重複的Meter組成一句詩，以Iambic為例：
- Dimeter: 兩個 Iambic
- Trimeter: 三個 Iambic
- Tetrameter: 四個 Iambic
- Pentameter: 五個 Iambic
- Hexameter: 六個 Iambic
- Heptameter: 七個 Iambic
就像中文的七言絕句之類的，英文裡，也有規定每句長度的制式。
例如，Limericks 是使用Anapestic meter的五行詩。第一、二行和第五行用三個Anapestic，第三、四行用兩個Anapestic. 相應的，第一、二行和第五行壓一個韻，第三、四行壓一個韻。Limericks 的詩大多是幽默的。
以Lewis Carroll 的 Alice in Wonderland 為例：
There was a young lady of station
“I love man” was her sole exclamation
But when men cried, “You flatter”
She replied, “Oh! no matter!
Isle of Man is the true explanation.
Alice in Wonderland
Limericks是有押韻要求的，但也有沒押韻要求的制式。
例如，Blank Verse 是 unrhymed Iambic Pentameter.
換句話說，就是要求每句都是五個輕重的重複，但不要求句數和押韻。
威廉·莎士比亞的《哈姆雷特》中著名的 To be or not to be 就是一首Blank Verse.
To be, or not to be, that is the question:
Whether ’tis nobler in the mind to suffer
The slings and arrows of outrageous fortune,
Or to take arms against a sea of troubles
And by opposing end them. To die—to sleep,
No more; and by a sleep to say we end
The heart-ache and the thousand natural shocks
That flesh is heir to: ’tis a consummation
Devoutly to be wish’d. To die, to sleep;
To sleep, perchance to dream—ay, there’s the rub:
For in that sleep of death what dreams may come,
When we have shuffled off this mortal coil,
Must give us pause—there’s the respect
That makes calamity of so long life…
To be or not to be
還有更複雜的制式，例如著名的莎士比亞十四行詩 (Shakespearean Sonnet)。
Sonnet 是 14 lines of Iambic Pentameter, 押韻要求是ababcdcdefefgg （每個字幕代表一行的韻腳）。
To me, fair friend, you never can be old,
For as you were when first your eye I eyed,
Such seems your beauty still. Three winters cold
Have from the forests shook three summers’ pride,
Three beauteous springs to yellow autumn turned
In process of the seasons have I seen,
Three April perfumes in three hot Junes burned,
Since first I saw you fresh, which yet are green.
Ah, yet doth beauty, like a dial-hand,
Steal from his figure, and no pace perceived;
So your sweet hue, which methinks still doth stand,
Hath motion, and mine eye may be deceived:
For fear of which, hear this, thou age unbred:
Ere you were born was beauty’s summer dead.
Shakespear Sonnet 104
莎士比亞十四行詩 (Shakespearean Sonnet) 又叫做英式十四行詩 (English Sonnet).
相應的，還有意式十四行詩，押韻要求是abbaabbacdcdcd 或者 abbaabbacdecde.
例如，Elizabeth Barrett Browning 的 How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
(abbaabbacdcdcd)
有嚴格要求的制式，也就有沒甚麼限制的制式。Free Verse, 就是這種對Meter, 押韻和句數都沒有任何要求的離譜制式。這大概就像中文的詩歌發展到現代，變成了更像大白話的樣子吧。
當然了，更多的英文詩，是介於嚴格的規律和Free Verse之間的——可能大部分邊幅會遵從某個Meter, 但偶爾幾句會換一種；可能大多數句子按某種規律押韻，但某幾句會換一種規律；句子長度可能大部分是某個Meter數，但偶爾會變一變。
大概，如果這種自成的規律用得多了，就會成為某種像Limericks一樣的制式。
例如Stanza, 是一種以四句為一組，可以有特定的押韻和韻律，也可以沒有，總句數不定的一種制式。
William Blake 的 Auguries of Innocence 就是一首Stanza。
這首詩的前四句特別著名，翻譯成中文的話很多人都聽過：
一沙一世界，
一花一天堂。
無限掌中置，
剎那成永恆。
它的全文，其實有132行：
To see a world in a grain of sand,
And a heaven in a wild flower,
Hold infinity in the palm of your hand,
And eternity in an hour.
A robin redbreast in a cage
Puts all heaven in a rage.
A dove-house fill’d with doves and pigeons
Shudders hell thro’ all its regions.
A dog starv’d at his master’s gate
Predicts the ruin of the state.
A horse misused upon the road
Calls to heaven for human blood.
Each outcry of the hunted hare
A fibre from the brain does tear.
A skylark wounded in the wing,
A cherubim does cease to sing.
The game-cock clipt and arm’d for fight
Does the rising sun affright.
Every wolf’s and lion’s howl
Raises from hell a human soul.
The wild deer, wand’ring here and there,
Keeps the human soul from care.
The lamb misus’d breeds public strife,
And yet forgives the butcher’s knife.
The bat that flits at close of eve
Has left the brain that won’t believe.
The owl that calls upon the night
Speaks the unbeliever’s fright.
He who shall hurt the little wren
Shall never be belov’d by men.
He who the ox to wrath has mov’d
Shall never be by woman lov’d.
The wanton boy that kills the fly
Shall feel the spider’s enmity.
He who torments the chafer’s sprite
Weaves a bower in endless night.
The caterpillar on the leaf
Repeats to thee thy mother’s grief.
Kill not the moth nor butterfly,
For the last judgement draweth nigh.
He who shall train the horse to war
Shall never pass the polar bar.
The beggar’s dog and widow’s cat,
Feed them and thou wilt grow fat.
The gnat that sings his summer’s song
Poison gets from slander’s tongue.
The poison of the snake and newt
Is the sweat of envy’s foot.
The poison of the honey bee
Is the artist’s jealousy.
The prince’s robes and beggar’s rags
Are toadstools on the miser’s bags.
A truth that’s told with bad intent
Beats all the lies you can invent.
It is right it should be so;
Man was made for joy and woe;
And when this we rightly know,
Thro’ the world we safely go.
Joy and woe are woven fine,
A clothing for the soul divine.
Under every grief and pine
Runs a joy with silken twine.
The babe is more than swaddling bands;
Every farmer understands.
Every tear from every eye
Becomes a babe in eternity;
This is caught by females bright,
And return’d to its own delight.
The bleat, the bark, bellow, and roar,
Are waves that beat on heaven’s shore.
The babe that weeps the rod beneath
Writes revenge in realms of death.
The beggar’s rags, fluttering in air,
Does to rags the heavens tear.
The soldier, arm’d with sword and gun,
Palsied strikes the summer’s sun.
The poor man’s farthing is worth more
Than all the gold on Afric’s shore.
One mite wrung from the lab’rer’s hands
Shall buy and sell the miser’s lands;
Or, if protected from on high,
Does that whole nation sell and buy.
He who mocks the infant’s faith
Shall be mock’d in age and death.
He who shall teach the child to doubt
The rotting grave shall ne’er get out.
He who respects the infant’s faith
Triumphs over hell and death.
The child’s toys and the old man’s reasons
Are the fruits of the two seasons.
The questioner, who sits so sly,
Shall never know how to reply.
He who replies to words of doubt
Doth put the light of knowledge out.
The strongest poison ever known
Came from Caesar’s laurel crown.
Nought can deform the human race
Like to the armour’s iron brace.
When gold and gems adorn the plow,
To peaceful arts shall envy bow.
A riddle, or the cricket’s cry,
Is to doubt a fit reply.
The emmet’s inch and eagle’s mile
Make lame philosophy to smile.
He who doubts from what he sees
Will ne’er believe, do what you please.
If the sun and moon should doubt,
They’d immediately go out.
To be in a passion you good may do,
But no good if a passion is in you.
The whore and gambler, by the state
Licensed, build that nation’s fate.
The harlot’s cry from street to street
Shall weave old England’s winding-sheet.
The winner’s shout, the loser’s curse,
Dance before dead England’s hearse.
Every night and every morn
Some to misery are born,
Every morn and every night
Some are born to sweet delight.
Some are born to sweet delight,
Some are born to endless night.
We are led to believe a lie
When we see not thro’ the eye,
Which was born in a night to perish in a night,
When the soul slept in beams of light.
God appears, and God is light,
To those poor souls who dwell in night;
But does a human form display
To those who dwell in realms of day.
Auguries of Innocence
這首詩的押韻規律，除了前四句是ABAB, 後面的都是AABB. 詩裡大多數是Iambic的韻律, 但也有Anapestic, Trochaic, 和 Spondee. 句子的長短不一，據說是為了增加passion and fury.
雖然英文詩用的隱喻和典故和中文的不同，但有些是相通的。例如第5到8句提到兩種鳥，鳥象徵自由與清白，在英文如此，在中文中也不難作出同樣解讀。
這首詩分析下去，逐行逐詞的解析，流程大至與分析中文詩沒差。
總結起來，讀英文詩，要注意的是韻律 (Meter)和押韻 (Rhyme), 其次可以看看句子長度和句數、句組。詩不一定遵從甚麼規律（如Free Verse），但韻律和押韻總是能讓詩更好聽的，而韻律比押韻更重要。
