The Island Within

“The Island Within” has two stanzas, and both contain free verse, with no established end rhyme scheme. The poem does employ enjambment and instances of internal rhyme to create a sense of musicality that carries the reader through the poem. The poet Richard Blanco acknowledges that the influence of poets who favor long lines and rich imagery, and he employs some of those formal characteristics in “The Island Within.” Blanco does not use any formal end rhymes, but internal rhymes do appear. For example, in Line 1 the rhyme “porch light” (Line 1) echoes in Line 3 with the phrase “last night” (Line 3) creating a ringing music from Lines 1 to 3.

Many of Blanco’s lines are enjambed, which gives the poem a sense of speed and urgency and places emphasis on certain enjambed words. Enjambment creates a feeling of being carried quickly from one line to the next as there is usually no punctuation to stop the reader at the end of the line. When enjambment is present in a free verse poem, enjambed lines add a sense of form within the unstructured poem.