French alexandrine can be dated exactly: 1886; in this year, editor Gustave Kahn published several seminal ' poems in his review ', including poems by Arthur Rimbaud (written over a decade previously) and Jules Laforgue, with more following in the next years. ' shed all metrical and prosodic constraints, such as verse length, rhyme, and caesura; Laforgue said, "I forget to rhyme, I forget about the number of syllables, I forget about stanzaic structure." French alexandrine The French alexandrine () is a syllabic poetic meter of (nominally and typically) 12 syllables with a medial caesura dividing the line into two hemistichs (half-lines)
Accentual verse of syllables in each line is noted. <poem style="margin-left: 2em"> Baa, baa, black sheep, (4) Have you any wool? (5) Yes sir, yes sir, (4) Three bags full; (3) One for the mas-ter, (5) And one for the dame, (5) And one for the lit-tle boy (7) Who lives down the lane. (5) </poem> Accentual verse derives its musical qualities from its flexibility with unstressed syllables and tends to follow the natural speech patterns of English. Accentual verse was a traditionally common prosody in Germany, Scandinavia, Iceland and Britain. Accentual verse has been widespread in English poetry since its earliest