You will remember that the wizard said,
“When you have mastered meter, you will be tempted to add rhyme. Do not do this. Rhyme draws attention to your meter and makes it predictable.”
This is particularly true of anapestic meter; two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable, (da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM, da-da-DUM)
Anapestic meter is often called “galloping meter” because it rapidly tumbles off the tongue allowing you to speak very quickly.
Read these lines out loud as quickly as you can:
“’Twas the night before Christmas when all through the house not a creature was stirring not even a mouse the stockings were hung by the chimney with care in hopes that St. Nicholas soon would be there the children were nestled all snug in their beds while visions of sugar-plums danced in their heads and mamma in her ‘kerchief and I in my cap had just settled our brains for a long winter’s nap when out on the lawn there arose such a clatter I sprang from my bed to see what was the matter away to the window I flew like a flash, tore open the shutters and threw up the sash…”
Now you know why they call it “galloping meter”
Here’s another example of anapestic meter. (Dr. Seuss used anapestic meter exclusively in every book he wrote.)
“I say!” murmured Horton. “I’ve never heard tell
Of a small speck of dust that is able to yell.
So you know what I think?… Why, I think that there must
Be someone on top of that small speck of dust!
Some sort of a creature of very small size,
Too small to be seen by an elephant’s eyes…”
The Smithsonian says, “Removing the rhyme turns the bouncy, nursery-rhyme feel into something more serious, dramatic, or natural. It lets the galloping rhythm drive the text forward without sounding playful or predictable.”
“And the sound of a voice that is coming from deep in the woods where the shadow is heavy and no one can follow.”
“The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,
And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,
Like the leaves of the forest when Summer is green,
Like the leaves of the forest when Autumn hath blown,
For the Angel of Death spread his wings on the blast,
And the eyes of the sleepers waxed deadly and chill,
And there lay the steed with his nostril all wide,
And the foam of his gasping lay white on the turf,
And the tents were all silent, the banners alone,
And the widows of Ashur are loud in their wail.”
I removed all the rhyming lines from The Destruction of Sennacherib by Lord Byron, George Gordon so that you could feel the seriousness of the subject matter.