Wulf, you can always see Donne's thinking, but Shakespeare, in his plays, hides his. I always come away from teaching Shakespeare's plays with a sense of surprise at knowledge you know is there, but his knowledge at the same time of other things. Is Macbeth about Machiavellian power, empty ambition, or that there are forces moving the world and therefore intentionality is just another vain myth.

Love the poem, Chris. Very vivid, very interesting!

Obviously I also should have put blank verse.

There is something about rhyming verse that makes it easier to memorize; maybe because of its affinity to song? It also adds an extra dimension to the appreciation of a poet's acuity and breadth -- or at least it did before the advent of readily available rhyme dictionaries and computer searches. But in direct answer to your question, it can go either way as regards "power" or overall worth.

I myself have been known to write some darkly perverse limericks. 😈

https://www.worldofbooks.com/en-au/books/created-by-oxford-university-p/oxford-dictionary-of-rhymes/GOR006437430?gclid=EAIaIQobChMIx5an657D3QIVjKmWCh0mOQBiEAYYASABEgJcS_D_BwE

I would have preferred your 'darkly perverse limericks' than websites on non-writers ease of access.

Sometimes free and blank verse are more difficult to appreciate because of the epigrammatic qualities of rhyme but in these instances I always start with Milton rather than Shakespeare:

OF Mans First Disobedience, and the Fruit Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal taste Brought Death into the World, and all our woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat, [ 5 ] Sing Heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire That Shepherd, who first taught the chosen Seed, In the Beginning how the Heav'ns and Earth Rose out of Chaos:

This is slow, grave music that connects with the topic.

Or maybe rhyme?

Yet once more, O ye laurels, and once more

Ye myrtles brown, with ivy never sere,

I come to pluck your berries harsh and crude,

And with forc'd fingers rude

Shatter your leaves before the mellowing year.

Bitter constraint and sad occasion dear

Compels me to disturb your season due;

For Lycidas is dead, dead ere his prime,

Young Lycidas, and hath not left his peer.

Who would not sing for Lycidas? he knew

Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme.

He must not float upon his wat'ry bier

Unwept, and welter to the parching wind,

Without the meed of some melodious tear.

Both work in different ways. Both by Milton.

I agree with Karl that structured verse is easily remembered. I suspect that this was the primary utility of verse - as a means of passing down knowledge in cultures with no written language.

However, a rhyme is an extremely powerful spice. Indeed, many poetic techniques when used to excess can be overpowering.

We may arbitrarily divide poets into two main groups. The first, have a strong inclination to form - The Ancient Mariner - The Raven - are examples of the product. In these cases it seems to me that the story or theme is serving the poetic structure. The story has to conform to the structure. Just as the melody played in the right hand conforms to the chord structure played by the left.

The second group, reverse the priority completely. The 'left hand' is reserved for the story or theme. The poetry and the use of poetic techniques ultimately serve the story!

Which is best? - It might depend upon taste. Personally, it is Shakespeare's plain verse rather than the stilted use of poetry reserved for loyalty, that I prefer - that is where the real poetry is. As for the sonnets - I see them as very clever conundrums - I do not read them for their poetic content.

Stanley, I attach one of my poems.

I hope you like it.

Chris

If you go back further Wulf and Christopher you can find other methods of moulding thoughts and ideas together, such as inversion, as used in a line and repetition (used in Bible), and punning (Sumerian).

Chris, do you not think that many of Shakespeare's sonnets are very powerful? And what about Donne? Or are you not including 'wit', verbal and mental dexterity, in your dislike of 'stilted verse'? Donne's poetry is some of the best in the English language.

Anyway, poetry like now had different audiences and what was private, that is for the few to be shared in written form, of the 16th-17th centuries, had different motivations (career, friendship, reputation) to our present-day poetry (respect, fame, money). Private poetry was often less polished or poetical. Is Shakespeare's blank verse really that different from his sonnets and long poems. The vocabulary of Romeo and Juliet is the same as Venus and Adonis.

Stanley,

You are an education.

I admit that I can be a bit lazy. A good friend shares you enthusiasm for Shakespeare's sonnets - perhaps I simply don't get them - too much like hard work.

I don't know Venus and Adonis, so I can't make a judgement. Stanley, you have undone me. As you know I love poetry - but I am no scholar of the subject.

I will give Donne another go - perhaps the sonnets too. Now see what you have done!!!

Chris

Ah, my first good deed of the year!

The sonnets like Donne's poetry are meant to be hard work, Chris. They were written for the intelligentsia, so surely perfect for you and everyone else here, not the ordinary citizen. (We now know both can enjoy them).

The poem below: written so that the twists and turns of thought are clear, and followed gradually. Debating different forms of love, parental, spiritual and sensual, and how they can be connected, and in fact can be the same.

Air and Angels

By John Donne

Twice or thrice had I lov'd thee, Before I knew thy face or name; So in a voice, so in a shapeless flame Angels affect us oft, and worshipp'd be; Still when, to where thou wert, I came, Some lovely glorious nothing I did see. But since my soul, whose child love is, Takes limbs of flesh, and else could nothing do, More subtle than the parent is Love must not be, but take a body too; And therefore what thou wert, and who, I bid Love ask, and now That it assume thy body, I allow, And fix itself in thy lip, eye, and brow. Whilst thus to ballast love I thought, And so more steadily to have gone, With wares which would sink admiration, I saw I had love's pinnace overfraught; Ev'ry thy hair for love to work upon Is much too much, some fitter must be sought; For, nor in nothing, nor in things Extreme, and scatt'ring bright, can love inhere; Then, as an angel, face, and wings Of air, not pure as it, yet pure, doth wear, So thy love may be my love's sphere; Just such disparity As is 'twixt air and angels' purity, 'Twixt women's love, and men's, will ever be.

Wulf, you can always see Donne's thinking, but Shakespeare, in his plays, hides his. I always come away from teaching Shakespeare's plays with a sense of surprise at knowledge you know is there, but his knowledge at the same time of other things. Is Macbeth about Machiavellian power, empty ambition, or that there are forces moving the world and therefore intentionality is just another vain myth.

Love the poem, Chris. Very vivid, very interesting!