Mesodiplosis

You're the cream in my coffee
You're the salt in my stew
You'll always be my necessity
I'd be lost without you

You're the starch in my collar
You're the lace in my shoe
You'll always be my necessity
I'd be lost without you

— You're the Cream in My Coffee, 1928 song

Mesodiplosis, sister to Anadiplosis, is a word formed of three parts:

1. μέσος (Mesos), meaning "middle"
2. δίπλω (díplō), meaning "a doubling"
3. σις (-sis), suffix to turn verbs to nouns.

The doubling of middles, in this case, the middles of phrases. It is the opposite of Symploce, where consecutive phrases share beginnings and ends.

This is used to highlight something about the consecutive phrases, with multiple possible somethings available:

When the shared words are nearly inconsequential ones like "and" or "of", then it just serves to make the parallelism more noticeable, but if the shared words are more consequential like nouns or multi-word phrases, then the parallelism is less likely to just be for being artistic with words but to express some message about a difference or similarity between the phrases that share words.

English's usual word order is SVO (Subject-Verb-Object), which means that the simplest of these examples will share their verbs, and those aren't usually the most important part of a set of multiple sentences if they're the verb, especially because it can be much more implied, given how people do things within limits, so it's not always necessary to be precise on what's being done. For example: "Alice worked on the apple, Bob worked on the stone", the context that the first item is food and the second is non-edible implies that the two kinds of "work" can't be the same. You don't typically eat stones, after all. And "worked on" isn't doing much other than anchoring the statements in the past or present.

It's more common in languages that have a Subject-Object-Verb (SOV) structure—such as Ancient Greek, Latin, Sanskrit, and Japanese— because the object is frequently the most important part of the sentence and stays in place when describing multiple interactions with the same object.

Roses Are Red, Violets Are Blue... is a subtrope. I Don't Like You And You Don't Like Me examples have a chance to overlap with this if the Stock Phrase is split into multiple phrases with a comma or something. Contrast Symploce. Antimetaboles, consecutive phrases with their word order flipped, such as "Tous pour un, un pour tous" of The Three Musketeers, may also be anadiplosises, as well as mesodiplosises.

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Examples:

Fan Works

• Amaranthine Shadows: In the seventh chapter, this is Lost in Translation from Spanish to English: Galatea suffers from a PTSD flashback episode about Icy tearing her wings. The narration establishes a metaphor between that traumatic event and a spider eating a butterfly trapped in its spiderweb, so the pain caused by the spider's venom is equaled to the pain provoked by the flashback. So we have: "The spider's venom gnawing at her insides. Of the spidery memory of her broken wings." In the original Spanish text, the word "arácnido" is located in the middle of both phrases and used as both a noun (arachnid) and an adjective (spidery) to reinforce the parallel.
• Arrest Ye Merry Gentlemares: Rainbow Dash describing what changed in some people, connecting all the changes with "has a":
  Rainbow Dash: Spike has a beard, Big Mac has a horn, and Discord has a mane like a shampoo ad.
• Dungeon Keeper Ami:
  • "Time Flies": When Ami is thinking about her Student/Teacher Romance crush, she questions the ethics of it, inadvertently using "He was" Anaphora and "her" Mesodiplosis because of his multiple roles in relation to her:
    He was her employee. He was also her teacher, which made things doubly wrong.
  • "The Duel": Jared's summarizing an event that occurred between him and an "unsympathetic troll":
    Good for me, bad for him,
• Elementals of Harmony: Sideboard of Harmony: "How Pinkie Got Her Cutie Mark": Using "for" to indicate that all these are representing the same balance:
  Teferi: This plane seems to expect a balance. Creation for destruction. Order for chaos. Harmony for discord."
• A Game of Cat and Cat:
  • "Your Daily Public Service Announcement Against Underage Drinking, or, Don't Drink and Dash": Listing out the details needed to solidify for a good alibi, with the list items connected by Epiphora, Mesodiplosis, and Anaphora:
    "But we still need to get our story straight. How did we get there, why were we there, what were we drinking, what was the name of the—"
  • "Another Chapter of Just Talking": Connecting a sequence of questions with Anaphora of "Where" and Mesodiplosis "you".
    "Where are you from? Where did you learn to fight?"
  • "Prelude to Pandemonium": Should have-s, but didn't's are listed:
    It should have worked. He should have been impressed.
• Oversaturated World: Group Precipitation: "Highest of the High Rises, by ArtieStroke": repeated "NOT" for emphasis
  Sunset: Rainbow Dash, for the last time, I'm NOT God, you are NOT a Super Hayan, and this is NOT Dragon Pearl X.
• The Palaververse: Wedding March: "Be Sure to Arrive in Good Time, so You Miss None of the Excitement": Mesodiplosis of "called it" into Anaphora of "others called it" back into Mesodiplosis of "called it", when describing donkey Cunning:
  It wasn't one of the more dramatic magical gifts, donkey Cunning, but it earned its capital letter. Some called it unconscious genius, others called it being natural smart-alecks, and others called it things unrepeatable in polite company. Whatever you called it, it was a knack for understanding systems and how they worked, for building up a gestalt picture from scraps of the whole.
• The Petriculture Cycle: Inscape: "Prisoner's Base": Pinkie Pie's transformation chant that's made to have a lyrical/rhythmic quality, which "like a" Mesodiplosis helps with:
  Pinkie Pie found a secluded alleyway near the Residential District and began her old warm-up routine: "Flat like a pancake, round like a balloon, pointy like a pincushion, square like a cube." The fact that "balloon" and "cube" didn’t exactly rhyme had always bothered her a bit, but she didn’t really have the time to dwell on revisions.
• Quizzical: A Little Fixer-Upper: Apple Bloom's instructions on painting involve talking about how to breathe with "through your" Mesodiplosis:
  "Remember to sweep the brush up and down," said Apple Bloom. "And breath[e], in through your mouth, out through your nose."

Film — Live-Action

• Star Wars: Uses Anaphora and Mesodiplosis in its creeds:
  • The canonical Jedi Code is composed this way, with "There is" as both the Anaphora and Mesodiplosis:
    There is no emotion, there is peace.
    There is no ignorance, there is knowledge.
    There is no passion, there is serenity.
    There is no chaos, there is harmony.
    There is no death, there is the Force.
  • The Sith Code is less blatant about this, with "Through" Anaphora, but also features mesodiplosis in its middle section, with "I gain":
    Peace is a lie. There is only Passion.
    Through Passion, I gain Strength.
    Through Strength, I gain Power.
    Through Power, I gain Victory.
    Through Victory, my chains are Broken.
    The Force shall free me.''

Literature

• A Budding Scientist In A Fantasy World: A Small Town in Southern Illvaria: The first book's full title has an "In" in both the series title and the title for the book, and an Anaphora of "A" to start them both off.
• Bulwer-Lytton Fiction Contest: 2023 entries, one of the Romance category's Dishonorable Mentions uses a list of "the [Noun] (on/in) his [Noun]" comparative phrases to say how Doug feels about his love interest:
  She was the caviar on his blintz, the cream in his coffee, the hole in his donut, and the cherry on his chocolate sundae, thought Doug Penrose as he looked at Katie through the haze of the Labor Day barbecue smoke, if only she’d stop nagging him about his weight.
  G. Andrew Lundberg, Los Angeles, CA
• "Goblin Market":
  • The fifth and sixth lines start the product listing for the titular market, with "and" being the middle of those lines, probably to lengthen the lines beyond the unusually short 2 word lines for a poem.
    Apples and quinces,
    Lemons and oranges,
    Plump unpeck'd cherries,
    Melons and raspberries,
  • Noting how some sold fruits are good to the senses, with "and" as a divider, even as phrases are not separated by a comma.
    Sweet to tongue and sound to eye;
• Jabberwocky: Comparing threats of the jaws and claws of the Jabberwock:
  The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!
• "Keeping Quiet" by Pablo Neruda, starts with instructions to "we all":
  Now we will count to twelve
  and we will all keep still.
• Lyttle Lytton Contest: The 2008 Fantasy Fiction winner, uses "Of" Mesodiplosis for song lyrics presumably because it makes it easy to continue singing by just listing other possessions:
  "Toads of glory, slugs of joy," sang Groin the dwarf as he trotted jovially down the path before a great dragon ate him because the author knew that this story was a train wreck after he typed the first few words. — Alex Hall, Greeley, CO
• Princesses of the Pizza Parlor: In Grandmothers and Other Fearsome Encounters: Epiphora of how "dangerous" the Magic Misfires from non-standard spell enhancement can be, and mesodiplosis of the shared topic of "spells", and also "is", because an "also" is added for emphasis of the danger:
  Uncle: Piling up spells like that is dangerous. Adding heroic effort to spells is also dangerous.
• The Three Musketeers: The catchphrase of the group, in the original French, "Tous pour un, un pour tous", which "pour" Mesodiplosis as well as Anadiplosis.

Music

Artists:

• Baroness: "A Horse Called Golgotha"
  "Call the boy
  He's down the hallow
  Cull the tide
  Distill the rye"

• BLACKPINK:
  • "Ice Cream": "like" Mesodiplosis, as part of Shout Outs to other movies, like Free Willy, Billie Jean and Hot Wheels:
    "Get it free like Willy
    In the jeans like Billie
    You be poppin' like a wheelie"
  • "The Happiest Girl"
    "The doors we slammed
    The plates we smashed"
• The Fat Rat: "Out Of The Rain": "we're not" is a contraction of "we are not", and it's used to show that both "you" and "we" still have something to hold on to:
  But you are not alone
  And we're not out of hope
• ITZY: The English version of "Wannabe": "be" to "I'm" to "wanna be":
  "Won't pretend to be someone I'm not / Yeah I'll be staying true to myself (I wanna be me me me) / I won't change, I'm loving what I got / Cause I know I'm perfect just the way I am (I wanna be me me me) /I don't wanna be somebody / Just wanna be me, be me / I wanna be me me me"
• Jung Kook: "3D".
  "I can't touch you through the phone
  Or kiss you through the universe"
• Ministry: "Hero":
  "They get you ready to fight
  The fuse is ready to blow"
• My Chemical Romance:
  • "Honey, This Mirror Isn't Big Enough For The Two Of Us: 2 segments:
    • I'm:
      "The amount of pills I'm taking
      Counteracts the booze I'm drinking
      And this vanity I'm breaking
    • "the" into "I'm":
      Well, I'll choose the life I've taken
      Never mind the friends I'm making
      And the beauty that I'm faking"
  • "Thank You for the Venom": "Give me"
    "So give me all your poison, and give me all your pills
    And give me all your hopeless hearts and make me ill"
  • "House of Wolves": Split as sentences instead of just comma-separation: "You better" Anaphora and "the [noun] 'cause they're never gonna [other noun]" Mesodiplosis:
    "You better run like the devil, 'cause they're never gonna leave you alone
    You better hide up in the alley, 'cause they're never gonna find you a home"
  • "Destroya":
    "You don't believe in God, I don't believe in luck
    They don't believe in us, but I believe we're the enemy!"
• Nine Inch Nails:
  • "Head Like A Hole": Joining up the topic of "You":
    "Bow down before the one you serve. You're going to get what you deserve."
  • "The Hand That Feeds": Joining up the topic of "You", while also using some Will You Anaphora:
    "Just how deep do you believe? Will you bite the hand that feeds? Will you chew until it bleeds? Can you get up off you knees? Are you brave enough to see? Do you want to change it?"
  • "Capital G": "Pushed a button and":
    "I pushed a button and elected him to office and a
    He pushed a button and it dropped a bomb
    You pushed the button and could watch it on the television"
  • "Came Back Haunted": The unknown "something":
    "Now I've got something you have to see
    They put something inside of me"
• Steven Wilson:
  • "Veneno Para Las Hadas"
    "When you're young, you're sleepin'
    With the love you're feelin'"
  • "Routine"
    "Routine keeps me in line
    Helps me pass the time
    Helps me to sleep"
• TWICE: "What You Waiting For": "You" as a constant topic:
  "When you think nothing's alright / If you cannot find the GO sign / Don't be afraid, you know you're where you're meant to be"
• Victoria Justice: "Tripped":
  "Fall for your kiss
  Slipped on your lips"

Albums:

• Black Holes and Revelations: "Starlight": "And":
  "Our hopes and expectations / Black holes and revelations"
• Blackwater Park: "Bleak": "Still", to "Are" but 3/4 having "From the":
  "Beating, Heart still beating for the cause
  Feeding, soul still feeding from the loss
  Aching, limbs are aching from the rush
  Fading, you are fading from my sight"
• Christmas Eve and Other Stories: "Old City Bar":
  "And the snow it was falling
  The neon was calling
  The music was low"
• Scary Monsters (And Super Creeps): "Ashes to Ashes":
  Ashes to ashes, funk to funky

Songs

• You Belong with Me: Contrasting the protagonist and her love rival, one consecutive two-part phrase has the shared middle of "wear", although the first use is the grammatically correct "wears":
  She wears short skirts, I wear T-shirts

Puppet Shows

• Fraggle Rock: In "The Honk of Honks", Gobo notices that Doc can't see him. Cantus, when explaining to Gobo what he must do so that Doc will be able to see him, uses the word "touch" in the middle of three consecutive phrases.
  Cantus: You must let the Silly Creature touch you, and you must touch him. Once touched, he will see, and so will you.

Tabletop Games

• Magic: The Gathering: The Flavor Text of "Squandered Resources", talking about a Chain of Deals, with "for" every link in the chain.
  He traded sand for skins, skins for gold, gold for life. In the end, he traded life for sand.

Video Games

• From the beginning of The Several Journeys of Reemus, as part of an example of Well, This Is Not That Trope, a list of a person's reputations are listed: "[Emotion] by [Group]":
  Many moons ago in the Kingdom of Fredericus, there lived a champion dragon slayer. Beloved by the people, feared by outlaws, hated by dragons.
• Super Smash Bros. Brawl: "Audi Famam Illius" has its Epiphora lines "Spes omnibus, mihi quoque. / Terror omnibus, mihi quoque." as translated, (possibly wrongly or with inaccuracies, in the end game credits of The Subspace Emissary as this "by many — I, too" Mesodiplosis and "him" Epiphora, talking about the song's subject's reputation:
  Revered by many — I, too, revere him
  Feared by many — I, too, fear him

Webcomics

• The Handbook of Heroes: "Bastard Sword": The caption talking about a blood-seeking sword, vs. a murderous person wielding a regular sword, using "some" Anaphora and "are" Mesodiplosis to connect the comparisons:
  Some swords are intelligent. Some adventurers are crazy. Learn to tell the difference.

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