Mmm, so true.

>To my mind, your version (using proper modern grammar) was the more formal, while my version (using a more archaic >manner of speech... "I then" is so rarely used anymore) sounded more playful to my ear.

Ah, but to my ear, corrupted no doubt by my misspent youth, your usage sounds perfectly normal... but then I only started reading modern poetry and literature for pleasure within the last five years and the judgement of someone to whom iambic pentameter sounds absolutely normal is not to be trusted. :)

>As for "iambic tetrameter" and so forth, I stand in awe of your linguistic prowess.

*giggle* I was a Montessori kid, so knowing the proper names for everything is almost an obsession...

tetrameter= four feet (I laughed|I cried|I then|replied|) and iambic=a light stress followed by a heavier one (so laughed is more stressed than I). Anapest= two light stresses followed by a heavier: I replied, with I and re- getting a ligher stress than -plied.

>Thanks for sharing your story of "MS Word user to poetical programmer" :-)

It's all Yitzchak's fault! ..and a fair trade, I guess. He gave me Perl and I gave him poetry... well, perhaps not so fair a trade.. he can write Perl and I can't write poetry, I just quote it and critique it!

Eliana