Free Verse

Free verse is the most popular poetic form used by twentieth and early twenty-first century poets, and it is the form Castillo uses in writing "While I Was Gone a War Began." Walt Whitman was perhaps the first poet to use this form, and it was quite a shock to readers in 1855 who were used to poems with strict metrical and rhyme patterns (for example, sonnets). Free verse avoids patterns and fixed line lengths. In fact, free verse varies line length to aid in achieving a desired impact. Rhythm and sound patterns are created by the use of assonance, alliteration, internal rhyme, and the like. Rhythm is also created within lines by designing phrases of about equal length and by repeating phrases that have the same syntactical structure. The result is a cadence similar to the balance of phrases in a musical composition. Castillo uses this cadence...