Euphony is more like a compliment than a clearly defined metrical term. It means "beautiful sound" in Greek, and to use it is to make a judgment that the language in question is euphonious. Nevertheless, those who are not too put off by what may seem showiness, artificiality, or sentimentality find much euphony in some poetry by Edgar Allen Poe, a specimen of which appears below. The opposite of euphony is cacophony, or "ugly sounds." Some people find poems by Thomas Hardy cacophonous, and sometimes poets aim at that, as in Pope's line from the Essay on Criticism, "The hoarse, rough verse should like the torrent roar." Poe's "The Bells" is also full of onomatopoeia:

                                    Hear the sledges with the bells-
                                               Silver bells!
                               What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
                                      How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
                                          In the icy air of night!
                                      While the stars that oversprinkle
                                      All the heavens, seem to twinkle
                                         With a crystalline delight;
                                            Keeping time, time, time,
                                         In a sort of Runic rhyme,
                               To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
                                         From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
                                               Bells, bells, bells-
                               From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.

Use the backup arrow on your browser to return.