[Lhynard]

I have a rather complicated problem that I will try to carefully explain below.

I am writing an epic poem. (Yes, an epic poem.) The formatting I want is as
follows:

I want every page to have two columns.

My poem has cantos (like chapters) and sections (within those cantos).

The poem has 4 line stanzas, except that every section ends with a doublet
(2-line stanza.

I am using line numbering for every fourth line, so that the last line of
every stanza has a line number by it. However, since the end of a section has
a couplet instead of a quartet, a section messes this up so that the line
number now shows in the middle of every stanza.

I would rather have the line numbering COUNT the two lines of the couplet
but not display the number till the end of the next quartet.

Example:
How it looks now:

Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah
4 Blah blah blah

Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah

****

Blah blah blah
8 Blah blah Blah
Blah blah blah
Blah blah Blah

How I want it to look:

How it looks now:

Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah
4 Blah blah blah

Blah blah blah
Blah blah blah

****

Blah blah blah
Blah blah Blah
Blah blah blah
10 Blah blah Blah

I thought one way I could make this work would be to add a continuous
section break. Then I could "reset" the line numbering with each section and
begin the numbering of the second section manually so that it continues from
the previous section.

However, when I added the continuous section break, it split my columns.
That is, it drew an invisible line horizontally across the page. The first
section wrapped to the second column when it reached this line. The second
section started on the left column below this line and wrapped to the second
column below this line. I don't want the column formatting to behave any
differently than if there were no section break.

Example:

# = lines
* = section break

What I want it to do:

1 10
2
3 11
4 12
13
5 14
6
15
* 16
17
7 18
8
9

What it does instead:

1
2 5
3 6
4
*

7 13
8 14
9
10 15
16
11 17
12 18

Is there any way to solve my problem?

Thanks for reading through this long and complicated question.