Yes, the root question here has to do with the scanning of verse, not with not being able to get tunes out of your head.

For some reason I seem to be pretty well able to scan stuff I read in order to make it make sense -- which has to do with knowing which syllables to unnaturally unstress, how many "take-up" syllables tehre are at the start of a line, etc. I know others find this harder. I wonder if it's some sort of innate thing -- the tendency anyway. Just as there are other things I find very difficult that others do as easy as breathing.

Thanks for the visual, Amergin. Oy.

Alex