The rhythms of all poetry and recited literature bear a relationship to breathing patterns. When the sentence is long and natural, a relaxed breathing style is expected; when irregular or jumpy, an erratic breath pattern is suggested. Compare the jabbing style of twentieth-century verse with the more relaxed lines of that which preceded it. Something has happened between Pope and Pound, and that something is very likely the accumulation of syncopations and offbeats in the soundscape. And the perceptible jitteriness in Pound’s verse begins after he has moved from rural life in America to the big city of London. Just as human conversational style is abbreviated by the telephone bell, contemporary verse bears the marks of having dodged the acoustic shrapnel of modern life. Car horns punctuate modern verse, not bubbling brooks.
