Nemerov's "Deep Woods" is constructed in blank verse, with nearly every line written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. Though blank verse can generally refer to any unrhymed poem, most often the lines contain five two-syllable feet with the first syllable accented, the second unaccented. If the poem is read through slowly, tapping out each syllable with a finger, the number of syllables adds up to ten per line with an accent pattern of TA-da, TA-da, TA-da, and so forth. This poem is more relaxed in style than Nemerov's earlier work, and the ideas are presented in a more direct manner than those demonstrated through strict adherence to line number and rhyme scheme. Describing the poems in The Salt Garden, critic Ross Labrie, in his book Howard Nemerov, says the poems' "lines are less jagged than had been the case earlier as Nemerov begins to settle into a flexible...