ENGLISH 11

1. ENGLISH 11 POETRY DEVICES

2. Speaker • voice that addresses the reader; author and speaker are NOT necessarily the same • Example: Speaker = an object I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions.What ever you see I swallow immediatelyJust as it is, unmisted by love or dislike ~ Sylvia Plath

3. Rhythm • – pattern of sound created by the arrangement of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line • Example: See Meter

4. Meter • a regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables that set the overall rhythm of certain poems • Example: iambic pentameter – U / U / U / U / “The brain is wider than the sky” (Dickenson)

5. Rhyme • repetition of similar sounds in words that appear close to each other in a poem

6. Internal rhyme • occurs within a single line of poetry • Example: “Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December, and each separate, dying ember wrought its ghost upon my floor.”

7. End rhyme • occurs at the end of lines • Example:

8. Slant(eye) rhyme • words that nearly, but not exactly, rhyme • Example: “prove” and “glove” • Example: “farm” and “yard”

9. Rhyme scheme • pattern of rhyme formed by end rhyme; identified by assigning a different letter of the alphabet to each new rhyme • Example: A word is dead a When it is said a Some say b I say it just c Begins to live d That day. b

10. Alliteration • the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words • Example: “Two hours later, shortly before dark, the panting puppy pack returned.” ~ Jim Kjelgaard, Irish Red

11. Assonance • the repetition of vowel sounds within words or at the ends of words • Example: while I try to weigh what you might say, okay?

12. Consonance • repetition of consonant sounds within words or at the end of words • Example: the letter sat atop her stack

13. Onomatopoeia • use of a word or phrase that imitates a word it describes • Example : “buzz” “splat” “hiss”

14. Imagery • – descriptive language that evokes an emotional response and appeals to the senses – sight, sound, touch, taste, or smell • Example: Over the winter glaciersI see the summer glow.And through the wild-piled snowdriftThe warm rosebuds below. (Beyond WinterRalph Waldo Emerson)

15. Simile • figure of speech that uses words such as “like” or “as” to compare seemingly unlike things • Example: The trees looked like pitch forks against the winter sky.

16. Metaphor • compares or equates seemingly unlike things by stating that one thing is another; does NOT use “like” or “as” • Example: “Death is a long sleep”

17. Personification • figure of speech in which an animal, an object, or an idea is given human characteristics • Example: “Shivering with the arms of death around him” (Hawthorne)

18. Stanza • a group of lines in a poem • Example: Over the winter glaciersI see the summer glow.And through the wild-piled snowdriftThe warm rosebuds below. (Beyond Winter Ralph Waldo Emerson)

19. Couplet • 2 lines of rhyme in a poem • Example: The night was creeping on the ground! She crept, and did not make a sound ~ James Stephens, Check