Amphibrach
Quick answer: An amphibrach is a three syllable metrical foot with the stress in the middle, da-DUM-da, as in umbrella. Learn how this rocking rhythm works in verse.
An amphibrach is a metrical foot of three syllables with the stress in the middle: da-DUM-da, as in umBRELla, deLICious and toGETHer. The name is Greek for short on both sides, which describes it exactly: one beat cushioned by a light syllable before and after. The result is a rocking, cradle-like movement, neither rising like the anapest nor falling like the dactyl.
You will rarely find whole English poems in sustained amphibrachs, but the foot is far from a museum piece. It shapes limerick lines, drives a good deal of light verse and song lyric, and slips into iambic poems whenever a line ends on an extra unstressed syllable. Russian poetry, by contrast, uses amphibrachic meter as a mainstream option, a reminder that a foot's status depends on the language it works in.
How It Works
Say these words aloud and feel the middle beat: reMEMber, exHAUSted, aBANdoned. Now a line built for this entry: the FERryman WAITS by the RIVer at MIDnight. Read it and your voice rocks, up in the middle of each foot and down at both ends, a rhythm closer to a lullaby than a march.
The amphibrach's gentle sway explains its habitats: limericks open with amphibrachic movement, there ONCE was a, and comic narrative verse borrows the same swing. In scansion debates, some prosodists prefer to redescribe amphibrachic lines as iambs with extra syllables or anapests displaced by one position, and sometimes both descriptions fit the same line. The foot is genuinely useful even so, because it names a rhythm the ear recognises instantly.
Where You Will See It
Limericks are the most familiar home; their characteristic swing is amphibrachic at heart. Goethe and the Russian poets, including Lermontov, wrote sustained amphibrachic meter, and in English, poets from Browning to Auden have used amphibrachic passages, notably in ballads and songs. Much of Dr. Seuss sways between anapest and amphibrach depending on where you slice the feet. Listen to waltz-based song lyrics and you will often find amphibrachs carrying the melody's stresses.
How to Use It in Your Own Poems
Reach for amphibrachs when you want rock and sway: lullabies, sea poems, drinking songs, anything with a pendulum in it. Line endings need care, since finishing on the foot's final light syllable gives a soft, feminine ending; trim the last foot to end on the stress when you want a firmer close. Because the rhythm soothes so effectively, it can also be used against the grain, a menacing subject in a lullaby meter unsettles readers precisely because the sound keeps promising comfort.
What poets can take from this
- Build lines around words stressed on the middle syllable, like together and remember.
- Use amphibrachic rhythm for rocking motion: cradles, boats, swings, waltzes.
- Trim the final light syllable when a line needs to end firmly on a beat.
- Try a soothing amphibrachic meter over a dark subject for deliberate unease.
- If scansion turns ambiguous, trust the sway your ear hears over the labels.
Try it yourself
Write a lullaby of ten amphibrachic lines addressed to something that should not be soothed, a storm, a grudge, a sleeping volcano, and keep the rocking rhythm steady throughout.
Questions
What is the difference between an amphibrach and an anapest?
Stress position. An amphibrach carries its stress in the middle, da-DUM-da, as in umbrella. An anapest carries it at the end, da-da-DUM, as in understand. The amphibrach rocks; the anapest gallops.
Are limericks amphibrachic or anapestic?
Both descriptions circulate, and both capture something true. The limerick's swing can be sliced as amphibrachs or as anapests with loose openings. Metrists disagree cheerfully, and the form works the same either way.
Why is the amphibrach rare in English poetry?
English verse tradition standardised around iambs and, for triple time, anapests and dactyls, so the amphibrach was usually redescribed in those terms. In Russian and German poetry, different traditions made it a standard meter.
By the Writory editorial team, reviewed by working poets. Updated July 2026.
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