Enjambment (pron. injámment): incomplete syntax at the end of the line. In the following example, the string what thou and I is looking for a verb to complete it, but the line-ending interrupts the onward pressure of the syntax, creating a kind of tension that is released when the verb is encountered at the beginning of the next line:
I wonder, by my troth, what thou and I »
Did, till we lovd? Were we not weand till then?
(John Donne, The Good-morrow)
The word or phrase that completes the syntax and releases the tension is called the rejet (underlined in these examples): where the rejet is brief, as in the Donne example, the release is energetic, b…
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