Line breaks

Line breaks in poetry serve a function similar to sentences. There is, however, a logic to where to put a line break in a poem. These are the main ways to decide where your line break should go.

Breath—where would a person logically stop to breathe?

Meaning– how would you break your poem so that someone else would know how to read it the way you want?

End-stopped lines—this occurs when there is a natural pause to a line such as a period or a comma. It is closely related to breath but not the same.

Strong words—make sure that you don’t let your lines end in weak words like articles: the, and, of. Pick out a nice strong one, often a noun. One poem I just looked at used words like earth, stars, pockets, better.

Enjambment—(pronounced en-jam’ment or as it sounds, en-jamb-ment is where the meaning carries over onto the next line. An example of this occurs in the first stanza of the Patrick Lane poem, “Because I Never Learned”. If a person were going to break the lines at the end of a phrase, it might read,

“Because I never learned how to be gentle

and the country I lived in

was hard with dead animals and men

I didn’t question my father when he told me…”

Instead, Lane runs the lines in such a way that the reader repeatedly falls over edges of meaning.

“Because I never learned how

to be gentle and the country

I lived in was hard with dead

animals and men I didn’t question

my father when he told me…”

Enjambment is a fun technique. Try it but don’t overdo it. The reader will rebel if you overuse this one. When properly used, it disconcerts the reader in a good way. Think of a ride at the PNE that’s fun but not too scary.

American poet and novelist, Chris Abani suggests we read the poem as a tension between the lyric impulse–think of an arrow going sideways and the narrative impulse, an arrow going down. With poems there’s always that hope that we’re going to be wiser at the end than when we started. Or that we’ll be taken to a different place. So even in pretty avant-guarde work with very little story in the poem that conflict will still be at work between the lyric and narrative lines.

If you doubt that line breaks affect your perception of poetry, have a look at the following.

On Reading Poems to a Senior Class at South High by D.C. Berry

Before I opened my mouth I noticed them sitting there as orderly as frozen fish in a package. Slowly water began to fill the room though I did not notice it till it reached my ears and then I heard the sounds of fish in a aquarium and I knew that though I had tried to drown them with my words that they had only opened up like gills for them and let me in. Together we swam around the room like thirty tails whacking words till the bell rang puncturing a hole in the door where we all leaked out They went to another class I suppose and I home where Queen Elizabeth my cat met me and licked my fins till they were hands again.

Here’s the poem assembled as the poet meant it to be. I found it interesting how much the poem lost when I compressed it all into an ugly block. Originally, I’d really liked it. Then when I took away the line breaks, it seemed not nearly so great. I was relieved to find once the line breaks were back, I liked the poem again.

On Reading Poems to a Senior Class at South High by D.C. Berry

Before I opened my mouth

I noticed them sitting there

as orderly as frozen fish

in a package.

Slowly water began to fill the room

though I did not notice it

till it reached

my ears

and then I heard the sounds

of fish in a aquarium

and I knew that though I had

tried to drown them

with my words

that they had only opened up

like gills for them

and let me in.

Together we swam around the room

like thirty tails whacking words

till the bell rang

puncturing

a hole in the door

where we all leaked out

They went to another class

I suppose and I home

where Queen Elizabeth

my cat met me

and licked my fins

till they were hands again.