Poetry Terms

1. Poetry Terms

2. Free Verse • Poetry that does not have a regular meter or rhyme scheme. This poetry imitates the natural rhythms of speech.

3. Blank Verse • Poetry written in unrhymed iambic pentameter. Blank means not rhymed. • Verse used by William Shakespeare.

4. Iambic Pentameter • Five iambs - The most important verse in poetry form in the English epic and dramatic poetry.

5. Sonnet • A fourteen line poem, a lyric, and usually in iambic pentameter.

6. Ballad • A fairly short narrative poem written in a songlike stanza form.

7. Lyric • Poetry that does not tell a story but aims at expressing an author’s thoughts or emotions.

8. Imagery • Word pictures that appeal to the five senses

9. Catalog Poem • A catalog poem is built on a list of images. • Sometimes it builds into a rolling rhythm.

10. Scene • A setting which includes time and place • Setting may be implied or stated directly

11. Haiku • A Japanese poetry form • 17 syllables, 5-7-5 • presents images from everyday life • Contains seasonal word or symbol • Presents a moment of discovery or enlightenment

12. Extended Imagery • Images that continue through several lines of poetry.

13. Example of Extended Imagery “Then a mile of warm sea-scented beach; Three fields to cross till a farm appears, A tap at the pane, the quick sharp scratch And blue spurt of a lighted match.” Robert Browning From “Meeting at Night”

14. Cliche • An overused word, worn-out expression or phrase

15. Allusion • A reference to a statement, person, place, event, or thing that is known from literature, history, religion, myth, politics, sports, science, or pop culture.

16. Symbolism • A person, place, thing, or event that stands for itself and something beyond itself.

17. Figures of Speech

18. Simile • A figure of speech in which an explicit comparison is made between two things essentially unlike, using such words or phrases as like, as, than, similar to, resembles, or seems.

19. Metaphor • A figure of speech in which an implicit comparison is made between two things essentially unlike.

20. Personification • A figure of speech in which human attributes are given to an animal, an object, or a concept.

21. Hyperbole • An exaggeration for effect

22. Rhyme • Repetition of similar sounds or words, within a line or at the end of a line

23. Half-rhyme • Also called near rhyme or slant rhyme • Words are alike in some sound but do not exactly sound the same • Example: now and know

24. Approximate RhymesNear RhymesSlant Rhymes • Two words are alike in some sound but do not rhyme exactly • Example: now and know

25. Stanza • Group of consecutive lines in a poem that form a single unit • Couplet 2 • Tercet 3 • Quatrain 4 • Cinquain 5

26. Stanza Continued • Sestet 6 • Heptastich 7 • Octave 8

27. Rhyme Scheme • Applying the letters of the alphabet to new sounds of words at the end of each line. • I will go a • To the show a • We will eat b • At our seat b

28. Meters • Monometer = 1 • Dimeter =2 • Trimeter =3 • Tetrameter =4 • Pentameter =5 • Hexameter =6

29. Meter continued • Heptameter = 7 • Octameter = 8

30. Sound Words

31. Alliteration • Repetition of consonant sounds in words that are close together

32. Consonance • Repetition of consonant sounds within the words in a line of poetry

33. Assonance • Repetition of similar vowel sounds that are followed by different consonant sounds Example: base and fade young and love

34. Repetition • Words, phrases, or lines that repeat in the poem

35. Internal Rhyme • Words that rhyme within one line of poetry.

36. Internal Rhyme • Rhymes in the middle of a line • “Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary.” Edgar Allan Poe, from “The Raven”

37. Onomatopoeia • Words that sound like their meaning

38. Rhythm • Alternation of stressed and unstressed syllables in language

39. Meter • Poetic feet • A generally regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables

40. Kinds of Feet Meter or Rhythm • Iamb da Dah • Trochee Dah da • Anapest da da Dah • Dactyl Dah da da • Spondee Dah Dah • These sounds are syllables or words.

41. Scansion • Reading in an exaggerated way to find the rhythm (meter).

42. Theme • The underlying meaning or idea of the poem

43. Oxymoron • A figure of speech that combines apparently contradictory ideas. • Example: jumbo shrimp

44. Apostrophe • A figure of speech in which a writer directly addresses an absent or dead person, an abstract quality, or something non-human as if it were present and capable of responding.

45. Implied Metaphor • Comparison that suggests rather than directly states that one think is something else. • Words suggest the nature of the comparison.

46. Narration • Type of writing or speaking that tells about a series of related events. (The other types of writing are description, exposition, and persuasion.)

47. Style • The choice of words, phrases, and sentences • Placement on the page • Dialect or regional speech • Poetic forms, such as ode, ballad, sonnet, or lyric, to name a few

48. Diction • Choice of words

49. Speaker • The voice that is talking to us in a poem.

50. Pun • Play on multiple meanings of a word or two words that sound alike but with different meanings. Shakespeare was a great punster.