Syntax - Look Between the Letters

I want to spend some time exploring something that is not often explored in poetry, and that is syntax. Syntax is something that normally refers to written poetry although spoken poets have been known to play with pauses and punctuation.

So a working definition of syntax - the arrangement of words and phrases to create well-formed sentences in a language.

In linguistics, syntax are the rules of combining words. For example - "the big red barn" has some unspoken words. We know that "the red big barn" sounds weird to us. What rule is that? It is syntax. Syntax tells us how we are allowed to arrange our words.

Syntax also related to punctuation. For example, a comma can change the meaning of a sentence. "A panda eats shoots and leaves" talks about a panda's diet. "A panda eats, shoots, and leaves" discusses a murderous panda. That is all syntax.

Poet's have the pleasure of playing around with syntax to play around with meaning. Like we talked about in economy of language, every word is a decision. Every lack of word is a decision. The same is true for punctuation and word order. Every period and every comma is a decision. Ever lack of comma is a decision. In fact, every line break is a decision. It all plays with meaning.

For example:
By the fire sit the twins who will become women.

I can play with this to enhance meaning with a line break.

By the fire sit the twins
Who will become women.

I say the same thing, but now I ask this rhetorical question to the reader: "Who will become women?" The line has meaning on its own, new meaning, within the line break.

Really Cool Stuff.

So let us look at some poets who have had a LOT of fun with syntax. My favorite one to discuss is e.e. cummings. He was so into syntax that he refused to capitalize any letters in his name.



My advice is to take this slowly. Read. Re-read. Question everything. Constantly ask "why?" "Why did he make a line break?" "Why is there a parentheses?"

l(a

l(a
le
af
fa
ll
s)
one
l
iness

--e.e.cummings

Fun right? As you begin to ask "why?" a lot you begin to unfold the meaning of the poem. 

Here is something a bit easier to comprehend. You can FEEL FIRST here and then on the re-read begin questioning the text. Question it mercilessly. 

[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in]

BY E. E. CUMMINGS

i carry your heart with me(i carry it in

my heart)i am never without it(anywhere

i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done

by only me is your doing,my darling)

                                                      i fear

no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want

no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)

and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant

and whatever a sun will always sing is you

here is the deepest secret nobody knows

(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud

and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows

higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)

and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart

i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)

I leave you with a fun quote, "The Man Who Does Not Read Has No Advantage Over the Man Who Cannot Read" - Mark Twain 

-Rory