Short measure is really a term from hymnology, which is abbreviated SM in hymnals. It designates a stanza quatrain consisting of iambic trimeters in lines 1, 2, and 4, with the third line iambic tetrameter, usually rhyming abab, but also xaxa, with the first and third lines unrhymed. In many ways it is identical with "poulter's measure" of the Renaissance, so named because of the custom of gving an extra two eggs to anyone who bought two dozen; poulter's measure alternates lines of twelve syllables with lines of fourteen syllables, the rhythm of which tends to divide them so that they sound like short measure.
 

      My former hopes are fled,
            My terror now begins;
      I feel, alas! that I am dead
            In trespasses and sins.

      Ah, whither shall I fly?
            I hear the thunder roar;
      The Law proclaims Destruction nigh,
            And Vengeance at the door.

      When I review my ways,
            I dread impending doom:
      But sure a friendly whisper says,
            "Flee from the wrath to come."

      I see, or think I see,
            A glimmering from afar;
      A beam of day, that shines for me,
            To save me from despair.

      Forerunner of the sun,
            It marks the pilgrim's way;
      I'll gaze upon it while I run,
            And watch the rising day.
                              --William Cowper
 

                            I never saw a moor,
                            I never saw the sea;
                            Yet know I how the heather looks,
                            And what a wave must be.

                            I never spoke with God,
                            Nor visited in heaven;
                            Yet certain am I of the spot
                            As if the chart were given.
                                                    --Emily Dickinson

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