A reader asked for more information on the stresses in the “cradle” example in the earlier discussion on prosody. So here it is, diagrammed:
Bob Hass noted that while you can argue about exactly what is stressed in a line, generally in English, if you have an adjective before a noun, the noun is stressed. In the phrase, “a black bird,” for example, bird is stressed. If the adjective is added to the noun, making it a compound noun, the adjective is stressed. If you say “a blackbird,” the stress is on black.