Throughout his Metamorphoses, Ovid uses combinations of dactyls and spondees as a means to emphasize the feelings experienced by readers. The metrical rhythm created by strategic combinations of dactyls and spondees helps with the recitation of the poem, and the many poetic figures and interesting metrical occurrences help to form vivid emotions and dramatic pictures in the minds of readers.

Inde senilis hiems tremulo venit horrida passu,

(dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, spondee)

Aut spoliata suos aut quos habet alba capillos

(dactyl, dactyl, spondee, dactyl, dactyl, spondee)

Both lines 212 and 213 contain many dactyls, Line 212 contains 17 syllables and the most amount of dactyls allowed without drifting away from the meter requirements. Ovid’s use of the dactyls helps to exemplify the sadness and despair over the horrid winter stages of our lives, where our hair turns white and where we may ultimately die. Through the meter, Ovid creates a powerful and urgent moment, and the reader is able to feel the intensity of the winter.

Tempus edax rerum, tuque, invidiosa vetustas,

(dactyl, spondee, spondee, dactyl, dactyl, spondee)

omnia destruitis vitiataque dentibus aevi

(dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, dactyl, spondee)

paulatim lenta consumitis omnia morte

(spondee, spondee, spondee, dactyl, dactyl, spondee)

Ovid continues to use dactyls and spondees as a means to create an even more vivid picture of the events occurring. In Line 234, Ovid uses 3 dactyls and 3 spondees, employing an equal amount of both metrical features. The line begins with a dactyl, emphasizing the quickness and the fleeting nature of time, and continues with two spondees, emphasizing how time devours all things slowly and uses these spondees as a means to build up the emotions surrounding the decay due to time. The following two dactyls represents how quickly individuals age and decay.

Line 235 contains the maximum amount of syllables that are allowed within a line to meet the metrical requirements. Both time and jealous age destroy all things very quickly, and the dactyls are used to emphasize this quickness and build up the emotion surrounding the fear related to aging.

Line 236 contains a hyperbaton: “you consume all by means of a slow death”. Here, lenta morte is surrounding “consumitis omnia”, displaying artful word organization that presents a word picture of how time consumes all things by means of a slow death.