Question

Which statement best describes the rhyme schemes of "To My Dear Loving Husband" and "To the King's Most Excellent Majesty"?

a. Both poets primarily use couplets to link ideas about love and devotion; Bradstreet uses inversion to complete rhymes.
b. Both poets use couplets for rhyme scheme and structure, inverting sentences when needed to maintain the rhyme.
c. Bradstreet uses couplets throughout; Wheatley uses couplets and inverts sentences as needed for emphasis.
d. Bradstreet uses couplets for their overall rhyme scheme and structure; Wheatley uses couplets to enhance the poem as a song of praise.

Answer 1

b. Both poets use couplets for rhyme scheme and structure, inverting sentences when needed to maintain the rhyme.

Step-by-step explanation:

In the poems by Anne Bradstreet and Phillis Wheatley, both poems use couplets to make their rhymes, and in several ocassions they incert sentences when needed in order to maintain the rhyme, as you can see in the next excerpts:

Anne Bradstreet:

"Thy love is such I can no way repay;

The heavens reward thee manifold, I pray."

In a normal organization I pray would be the first sentence of the verse, but otherwise it would not rhyme, so she chose to put it at the end.

Phillis Wheatley

"The crown upon your brows may flourish long,

And that your arm may in your God be strong!"

THe second verse should read "And that your arm be strong in your God, but that wouldn´t rhyme so he chose to change the structure to keep the rhyme.

Answer 2

The statement best describes the rhyme schemes of "To My Dear Loving Husband" and "To the King's Most Excellent Majesty" is option b. Both poets use couplets for rhyme scheme and structure, inverting sentences when needed to maintain the rhyme. In poetry, a couplet is a pair of successive lines of meter that rhyme and have the same meter. The author uses this literary technique to call the reader's attention.