Double Dactyl

A double dactyl is also a verse form, also known as "higgledy piggledy", purportedly invented by Anthony Hecht and Paul Pascal in 1961, but having a history as a parlor word game earlier in the century. Like a limerick, it has a rigid structure and is usually humorous, but the double dactyl is considerably more rigid and difficult to write. There must be two stanzas, each comprising three lines of dactylic dimeter followed by a line consisting of just a choriamb ( ¯ ˘ ˘ ¯ ). The two stanzas have to rhyme on their last lines. The first line of the first stanza is repetitive nonsense. The second line of the first stanza is the subject of the poem, a proper noun (marked in these examples with a single asterisk, *, or where not exactly a proper name with a parenthesized asterisk (*)). Note that this name must itself be double-dactylic. There is also a requirement for at least one line of the second stanza to be entirely one double dactyl word, for example "va-le-dic-tor-i-an" (marked with two asterisks, **). Some purists still follow Hecht and Pascal's original rule that no single six-syllable word, once used in a double dactyl, should ever be knowingly used again.

A self-referential example by Roger L. Robison:

Long-short-short, long-short-short

Dactyls in dimeter,(*)

Verse form with choriambs

(Masculine rhyme):

One sentence (two stanzas)

Hexasyllabically**

Challenges poets who

Don't have the time.

An example by John Hollander:

Higgledy piggledy,

Benjamin Harrison,*

Twenty-third president

Was, and, as such,

Served between Clevelands and

Save for this trivial

Idiosyncrasy,**

Didn't do much.

An example by E. Jaksch:

Inheritance

Higgledy-Piggledy

Gay Caius Julius.(*)

Tribune sojourning a

Long way from home,

Seeking distraction in

Nicomedophily,**

Earned with his service a

Province for Rome.

A double dactyl by Paul Pascal on the subject of Antony and Cleopatra:

Tact

"Patty cake, patty cake,

Marcus Antonius,*

What do you think of the

African queen?"

"Gubernatorial**

Duties require my

Presence in Egypt. Ya

Know what I mean?"

An example about Joe DiMaggio by Washington Post writer Gene Weingarten:

Higgledy Piggledy

Joseph DiMaggio,*

Jolted the ball but was

Jilted in bed.

Marilyn walked, but he

Necro-romantically**

Laid her in rose bouquets

When she was dead.

In literature, Neil Gaiman's Stardust (novel) contains a double dactyl:

Hankety pankety

Boy in a blanket, he’s(*)

Off on a goose-chase to

Look for a star

Incontrovertibly**

Journeys through Faërie

Strip off the blanket to

See who you are.

John Bellairs' classic fantasy novel The Face in the Frost contains several double dactyls, used as nonsense magic spells, such as the following:

Higgledy-Piggledy

St. Athanasius*

Rifled through volumes in

Unseemly haste

Trying to find out if,

Hagiographically,**

John of Jerusalem

Liked almond paste.

And from Wendy Cope

Higgledy-piggledy

Emily Dickinson*

Liked to use dashes

Instead of full stops.

Nowadays, faced with such

Idiosyncrasy,**

Critics and editors

Send for the cops.

Abbreviated Lays,a collection of double dactyl poetry about Roman History using the Latin language, was written by Andres Reyes, Teacher at the famous Groton School in November 2003. He himself is a member of the form of 1980.

Double dactyl verse form is, perhaps unsurprisingly, rare in popular music. One example from this field is the song "Sam" by the Meat Puppets, which begins with the lyric: Maybe they had a/ridiculous statement/to make about something/they hadn't experienced.

A similar verse form called a McWhirtle was invented in 1989 by American poet Bruce Newling.

A related form is the double amphibrach, similar to the McWhirtle but with stricter rules more closely resembling the double dactyl.