Rhyme and Rhythm: Read and Respond

Rhyme and rhythm are important to poetry. They're also important to lyricists, people who write song lyrics. Hip-hop artists pay close attention to rhyme and rhythm when they write. To write your own hip-hop lyrics, you can use the tips in this song about rhyme and rhythm. But it's just as important to understand where the genre came from. Hip-hop was born in 1973 in the South Bronx. The South Bronx was a mostly poor community in New York City. Young people of color who didn't have the money to take music lessons or buy instruments started experimenting with scratching vinyl records. That's how they made the first hip-hop beats.

MCs rapped about their daily lives and what inspired them. They rapped about their struggles growing up in poor neighborhoods. And they rapped about how race affected their lives. Hip-hop was born from the creativity of underprivileged youth in New York City. But its addictive beats, clever lyrics and innovative style helped it gain popularity around the world. When you're writing and performing hip-hop lyrics of your own today, keep this history in mind. Express yourself. Don't get caught up in the stereotypes about hip-hop. It's a rich culture in its own right and a powerful tool for communicating information.

Based on this passage, which of the following is true about hip-hop?

• It was popular in many neighborhoods of New York City before 1973.

• It is a genre of music that was only ever popular in the South Bronx.

• It is a genre of music that is similar to poetry in some ways.

• Nobody really knows where or why it started.

A syllable is the smallest unit of pronunciation. One syllable usually includes one vowel sound and sometimes the consonants around it. The word "hip-hop" has two syllables, and they're easy to see: hip•hop. The word "hippopotamus" is made up of five syllables: hip•po•pot•a•mus. Take this sentence: "That hippopotamus loves hip-hop." It has nine syllables. The words "that" and "loves" have one syllable each. In many poems and songs, each line will have about the same number of syllables.

How many syllables are in the following line?

My rhinoceros writes rap.

• 4

• 7

• 9

• 11

When we speak, we stress certain syllables. In the word "hippopotamus," for example, we stress the third syllable: hip•po•POT•a•mus. If you stressed a different syllable, you'd mispronounce the word. In the song, we use the example of "present." With "present," the word you say actually depends on the syllable you stress. A PRES•ent is a gift. But to pre•SENT is to show something. One is a noun, and the other is a verb. So you could present a present!

In which of these sentences is the first syllable in the word "present" stressed?

• I didn't know we'd have to present our reports this Tuesday.

• The scientists stood to present their discovery to the eager crowd.

• I was so happy with the wonderful present I got for my birthday.

• It's time to discuss this week's news. Who'd like to present their headline first?

You'll sometimes hear rhythm in poetry called "meter." But both poets and lyricists think about stressed and unstressed syllables when they write. They practice reading their work aloud and rework their writing to create patterns. Rhythm comes from the patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables.

"Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" This is a famous line from Sonnet XVIII by William Shakespeare. In this line, every other syllable is stressed. This creates a rhythm like a heartbeat: da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM. This particular pattern, called iambic pentameter, is a common rhythm that you'll find in poems. A line in iambic pentameter has ten syllables, and every other syllable is stressed. In addition to the stress, poets and lyricists pay attention to the number of syllables per line. As a general rule, it's good to have close to the same number of syllables in each line.

Which of these two lines are in iambic pentameter?

• Where are the songs of spring? Ay, Where are they?

  Think not of them, thou hast thy music too,

  ("To Autumn" by John Keats)

• Hope is the thing with feathers

  that perches in the soul

  ("Hope is the thing with feathers" by Emily Dickinson)

• Let America be America again.

  Let it be the dream it used to be.

  ("Let America be America Again" by Langston Hughes)

• It was many and many a year ago,

  In a kingdom by the sea,

  ("Annabel Lee" by Edgar Allan Poe)

Rhyming words are words that sound the same at the end. They might just share part of the same last syllable, as in the words "reach" and "teach." They might also share two or more of their end syllables, like the last two syllables in the words "motion" and "devotion." Words do not have to be spelled the same to rhyme. That's because words in English can sound the same but have different spellings. For example, the word "comb" (pronounced kohm) rhymes with the word "home" and "foam," and "motion" also rhymes with "ocean." What's more, sometimes words that are spelled the same do not rhyme. We see this in the words "comb" (kohm) and "tomb" (toom).

When you're looking for words that rhyme, say them out loud. Take the last syllable(s) of the word and replace the beginning letter(s). Say the words that this forms out loud, too. To find a word that rhymes with "scare," you might go through the alphabet: "air," "bear," "care, "dare," "fare," "glare," "hare" and so on.

Choose the list of words that rhyme with "knife."

• leaf, brief, grief, fief

• kite, knit, knew, knock

• blow, so, dough, grow

• life, wife, wildlife, strife

In poems and lyrics, you won't just find words that rhyme with each other. You'll also find lines that rhyme. Remember, words rhyme if they have the same end syllable(s). Similarly, lines rhyme if they end in rhyming words. This is called "end rhyme." Rap songs use end rhyme a lot! That doesn't mean every single line of a rap song rhymes. Usually, there are two lines that rhyme. But the lines can follow different rhyming patterns, or rhyme schemes.

Choose the line that rhymes with the line below.

When it's snowing outside, and they cancel school...

• Then I'll grab my sled and coat and head for the hill.

• I'll look at the pool and be sad I can't go swim.

• "Cool!" I'll yell, looking for my coat and gloves.

• I'll be sad it's too cold to swim in the pool.

Rhyme scheme is a way to describe the pattern of end rhymes. Each new end sound gets its own letter. Sounds that repeat (rhyme) get the same letter. Here's an example from the hook of a Flocabulary song about nouns:

I'm the chef, and I love to cook. A

I have a lot of nouns in my recipe book. A

Places, things, ideas and people, B

When it comes to a chef, there is no equal. B

The rhyme scheme of the hook is AABB. This is a common rhyme scheme to see in hip-hop songs. You might also see ABAB rhyme scheme, AABA, ABBA and others.

What is the rhyme scheme of the stanza below?

Love has gone and left me and the days are all alike;

Eat I must, and sleep I will,—and would that night were here!

But ah!—to lie awake and hear the slow hours strike!

Would that it were day again!—with twilight near!

(from "Ashes of Life" by Edna St. Vincent Millay)

• AAAA

• AABB

• ABAB

• AAAB

The larger your vocabulary, the easier it is to write rhymes. That's because the more words you know, the more language you have to work with. If you're stuck with a word at the end of a line that doesn't have any relevant rhyming words, you have a few options. You can try a slant rhyme. You can also try to reword the line so that it ends in a different word. The new word may have more rhymes than the original end word. You can also try to replace the original end word with a synonym. You can see where vocabulary helps with this! If you can't think of a word that rhymes with "generous," for example, you could switch it for "philanthropic." Suddenly, there are a lot rhymes available: microscopic, topic, tropic and so on!

Once you've written rhyming lines, you're work isn't done. Rappers and poets revise their drafts. They look for ways to make the rhythm, rhyme and flow even better. After writing a draft, pay attention to the number of syllables in your lines. Can you make your lines have equal syllable counts? Look for places where you could add internal rhyme. Internal rhyme is when words within a line rhyme, not just at the end. Internal rhyme can make your lines even more catchy. Practice saying your lines out loud. You might find more ways to revise when you do.

According to the passage, once you have written lines that rhyme,

• your lyrics or poem is finished.

• you should revise your lyrics or poem for rhythm and flow.

• you should try rewriting every line to end with a synonym.

• you should make sure each line has a different number of syllables.

Rhyme and rhythm are great tools. But they aren't the only ways to add music to language. You can play with the sounds of your words in a lot of ways. For example, you can repeat the same consonant sound at the starts of words. That's called alliteration. Look at the repetition of the "cr" sound in this line: The crocodile is craving a crunchy critter. You can also use repetition, using the same words or phrases several times. When whole lines repeat, that's called a refrain or a hook. Another sound device is called onomatopoeia. That's when words sound like what they mean. Examples include "snap" and "buzz." Sound devices will help you create poems and songs that are fun to recite and share and easy to remember, too.

What sound device(s) does the stanza below contain?

Hear the sledges with the bells—

Silver bells!

What a world of merriment their melody foretells!

How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,

In the icy air of night!

While the stars that oversprinkle

All the heavens, seem to twinkle

With a crystalline delight;

Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells

From the bells, bells, bells, bells,

Bells, bells, bells—

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

(from "The Bells" by Edgar Allan Poe)

• repetition, alliteration and onomatopoeia

• onomatopoeia and alliteration

• repetition and refrain

• alliteration only