Rhymes

What stuck me most in Melville’s poetry was his use of rhyme. I think rhyme is an incredible poetic tool and that when used, in certain cases, can be extremely effective if not ironic. In Melville’s poetry I found that at times this irony was really explicit such as in the “Victor of Antietam”. Melville describes this horrible battle but all through his poem there is this sing-song kind of rhyme which really contrasts with some of the images he is presenting. For example he says “the leadsmen quarreled in the bay;/ Quills thwarted swords; divided sway;/ The rebel flushed in his lusty May:” Melville really makes the war sound more terrible by having this rhyme scheme because he uses an almost childlike voice to describe this bloody battle.
Melville shows the horror of war by contrasting it with the playfulness of rhyme but also the rhyme seems to represent the positive attitude, and the naivety of the soldiers before going into war. He says in “The march into Virginia. Ending in the First Manassas” : “Expectancy, and glad surmise/ Of battles unknown mysteries. / All they feel is this: ‘tis glory,/ A rapture sharp but transitory” the rhyme seems to indicate the upbeat nature of the new soldiers, of the patriotism behind the war. However then by saying that this rapture is transitory, Melville uses the rhyme to point out that these positive feelings will be destroyed by the true horrors of war.