Alliteration: • Example: Definition: Definition:

Definition: – “Back into the chamber turning, all • Repeating a word, phrase, line, or • The voice talking to us in a poem.
•The repetition of consonant sounds my soul stanza The
in Within me burning. multiple times within the poem. voice is NOT always the poet.
words that are close together. -Edgar Allen Poe, from “The Raven” • Example: Stanza:
•Example: Limerick: – “Go Down, Moses” chorus Definition:
•Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled Definition: Rhyme scheme: • A group of consecutive lines in a
peppers. How many pickled peppers • A very short humorous or Definition: poem
did nonsensical poem • The pattern of end rhymes in a that form a single unit. It is
Peter Piper pick? with five lines. poem. You can comparable to
Assonance: • Example: identify this by using different letters a paragraph in an essay.
Definition: – “I sat next to the Duchess at tea; of the
•The repetition of vowel sounds in It was just as I feared it would be; alphabet for each rhyme. Allusion
words that Her rumblings were abdominal • Example: passing reference or indirect
Ballad: Were truly phenomenal, – “A gentleman dining at Crewe, (a) mention
Definition: And everyone thought it was me!” Found quite a large mouse in his She was dancing below a noose, an
•A song or songlike poem that tells a -President Woodrow Wilson stew (a) allusion to the hanging of dissidents
story. Line: Said the waiter, “Don’t shout, (b) under her father’s regime.
•Examples: Definition: And wave it about, (b) —New York Times Aug 30, 2014
•“The Dying Cowboy” • A series of words written, printed, Or the rest will be wanting one too!” Apostrophe
• “The Cremation of Sam McGee” or (a) an address to an absent or imaginary
Cinquain: recited as one of the component’s – The Rhyme scheme of this limerick person
Definition: units of is aabba. Her unfortunate position, and the
• A five-line poem in which each line a larger piece of writing, such as a Rhyme: singular apostrophe she had
follows a poem. Definition: addressed to me, pierced me to the
End rhyme: Lyric poetry: • The repetition of accented vowel heart.
Definition: Definition: sounds —Jacques Casanova de SeingaltO
• Rhymes at the ends of lines. • Poetry that expresses the feelings and all sounds following them in stranger of the future!
• Example: or words O inconceivable being!
– “I have to speak-I must-I should thoughts of a speaker rather than that are close together in a poem. whatever the shape of your house,
-I ought… telling a Rhythm: however you scoot from place to
I’d tell you how I love you if I story. These poems are usually short Definition: place,
thought and • A musical quality produced by the no matter how strange and colorless
The world would end tomorrow imply, as opposed to stating, a repetition of the clothes you may wear,
afternoon. strong stressed and unstressed syllables or I bet nobody likes a wet dog either.
But short of that…well, it might be emotion or idea. by the I bet everyone in your pub,
too soon.” Metaphor: repetition of other certain sound even the children, pushes her away.
The end rhymes are ought, thought Definition: patterns. —To a Stranger Born in Some
and • An imaginative comparison • Example: Distant Country Hundreds of Years
afternoon, soon. between two – “The Assyrian came down like the from Now, Billy Collins
Epic: unlike things in which one thing is wolf on the Caesura
Definition: said to fold, a break or pause in the middle of a
• A long narrative poem that is be another thing. And his cohorts were gleaming in verse line
written in – Not a simile: metaphors do not use purple and But the third line, with its caesura
heightened language and tells the words gold; before the last foot, complicates the
stories of the “like” and “as” And the sheen of their spears was grandfather's absence, extends his
deeds of a heroic character who • Example: like stars on the influence, and begins to restore his
embodies – Jonny has a heart of stone. sea, existence.
that values of a society. Narrative poem: When the blue wave rolls nightly on —The Guardian Jul 15, 2013I'm
• Example: Definition: deep Galilee. nobody! Who are you?
– “Casey at the Bat” • A poem that tells a story. -Lord Byron, from “The Destruction Are you nobody, too?
– “Beowulf” – Not an epic: Epics have of Then there's a pair of us — don't
Figurative language: superhuman or Sennacherib” tell!
Definition: extraordinary happenings, narratives Simile: —I'm Nobody ! Who are you?, Emily
• An expressive use of language. do not. Definition: Dickinson
• Example: • Example: • A comparison between two unlike Consonance
– Simile – “Paul Revere’s Ride” things, the repetition of sounds especially at
– Metaphor Ode: using a word such as like, as, than, or the ends of words
Form: Definition: resembles. Occasionally the author breaks into
Definition: • A lyric poem, rhymed or • Example: verse, or stretches of consonance or
• The structure and organization of a unrhymed, on a – Her face was as round as a Couplet
poem. serious subject. These are typically pumpkin. a stanza consisting of two successive
Free verse: addressed to one person/thing. – The wind is roaring like a banshee. lines of verse
Definition: • Example: Sonnet: In "Keeping Hope Alive," he triggers
• Poetry without a regular meter or – “Ode to Thanks” Definition: a world of emotions in a brief
rhyme Onomatopoeia: • A fourteen-line poem, usually couplet: "Pride and pain/Cloud my
scheme. These poems may use Definition: written in brain."
internal • Using words whose sounds suggest iambic pentameter. —Los Angeles Times May 28,
rhyme, repetition, their • 2 kinds: 2014For sweetest things turn
Haiku: meaning. – Shakespearean: 3 four-line units sourest by their deeds;
Definition: • Example: and ends Lilies that fester smell far worse than
• Originating in Japan, a Haiku is a – Buzz with a couplet. weeds.
threeline – Rustle – Italian: poses a question or makes - Sonnet 94, William Shakespeare
poem which contains seventeen – Tinkle a point in enjambment
syllables. – Thud first eight lines and responds to that continuation from one line of verse
– 5 syllables in the first line Quatrain: in the last into the next line
– 7 syllables in the second line Definition: six lines. But poetry critics have a more
– 5 syllables in the last line • A poem or stanza of four lines. Sound devices: precise term for the kind of
Imagery: • Example: Definition: enjambment Obama employs: “bad
Definition: – Fly away, fly away over the sea, • Words that explain different line breaks.”
• Language that appeals to the Sun-loving swallow; for summer is sounds and —Salon Jul 17, 2012A thing of
seven done; functions within writing. beauty is a joy forever:
senses. Come again, come again, come back • Example Its loveliness increases; it will never
• Example: to me, – Alliteration Pass into nothingness but still will
– “Mrs. Flowers” Bringing the summer and bringing – Assonance keep
Internal rhyme: the sun. – Rhyme A bower quiet for us, and asleep
Definition: -Emily Dickinson – Rhythm Full of sweet dreams, and health,
• Rhymes within lines. Repetition: Speaker: and quiet breathing.
—Endymion, John Keats
Hyperbole
extravagant exaggeration
That’s not hyperbole; statistics prove
this to be true.
—Time Aug 17, 2014I’ll love you,
dear, I’ll love you
Till China and Africa meet,
And the river jumps over the
mountain
And the salmon sing in the street,
I’ll love you till the ocean
Is folded and hung up to dry
— As I Walked One Evening, W.H.
Auden
internal rhyme
a rhyme between words in the same
line
That songlike quality would fit well
in a poem, especially the internal
rhyme and near-rhyme of “night and
light” with “alike.”
—Washington Post July 17,
2014Double, double toil and trouble,
Fire burn and cauldron bubble
—Macbeth, William Shakespeare
Litotes
understatement for rhetorical effect
Litotes describes the object to which
it refers not directly, but through the
negation of the opposite.
—J.R. Bergmann, Veiled MoralityWe
were going through the three first
acts, and not unsuccessfully upon
the whole.
--Mansfield Park, Jane Austen
The litotes here is "not
unsuccessfully."
Metaphor
a figure of speech that suggests a
non-literal similarity
Her extreme cosmetic aesthetic has
been an apt metaphor for the
excesses and vanities of Hollywood.
—Salon Sep 4, 2014She really was a
most charming girl, and might have
passed for a captive fairy, whom that
truculent ogre, Old Barley, had
pressed into his service.
-Great Expectations, Charles Dickens
Octave
a rhythmic group of eight lines of
verse
One of these [two interpretations]
must be in the octave and the other
in the sestet.
—Joyce KilmerFor the moon never
beams without bringing me dreams
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And the stars never rise but I feel the
bright eyes
Of the beautiful Annabel Lee;
And so, all the night-tide, I lie down
by the side
Of my darling, my darling, my life
and my bride,
In the sepulchre there by the sea,
In her tomb by the sounding sea.
—Annabel Lee, Edgar Allan Poe
Onomatopoeia
using words that imitate the sound
they denote
What a succession of groans,
hurrahs, cheers, and all the
onomatopoeia of which the
American language is so full.
—Jules VerneIt went zip when it
moved and bop when it stopped,
And whirr when it stood still.
I never knew just what it was and I
guess I never will.
—The Marvelous Toy, Tom Paxton
Paradox
a statement that contradicts itself
The brilliant paradox of Flanagan’s
introspective novel is that a work of
such powerful remembrance should
so movingly capture our inmost a group of six lines of verse
longing to forget. In the sestet usually the first line
—Seattle Times Aug 27, 2014I can rhymes with the fourth, the second
resist anything but temptation. with the fifth and the third with the
— Oscar Wilde sixth.
personification —Charles Herbert SylvesterO
attributing human characteristics to mistress mine, where are you
Abstract Ideas roaming?
Gordon-Levitt may also direct and O stay and hear! your true-love's
star in the film, which is to tell the coming
story of the brooding hero That can sing both high and low;
Morpheus, the immortal Trip no further, pretty sweeting,
personification of dreams. Journey's end in lovers' meeting—
—Los Angeles Times Aug 22, Every wise man's son doth know.
2014Pearl Button swung on the little —Twelfth Night, Act II, Scene 3,
gate in front of the House of Boxes. William Shakespeare
It was the early afternoon of a Synaesthesia
sunshiny day with little winds playing a sensation that normally occurs in
hide-and-seek in it. one sense modality occurs when
—How Pearl Button Was Kidnapped, another modality is stimulated
Katherine Mansfield Synaesthesia is where the senses are
Anapest mixed together - for example seeing
a metrical unit with unstressed- colour when listening to music - or
unstressed-stressed syllables tasting food and hearing chords.
An Anapest is a three-syllable foot —BBC Apr 19, 2014Tasting of Flora
accented on the last syllable. and the country green,
—William Franklin Webster‘Twas Dance, and Provencal song, and sun
the night before Christmas, when all burnt mirth!
through the house —Ode to a Nightingale, John Keats
Not a creature was stirring, not even 35 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30 30
a mouse;
—'Twas the Night Before Christmas,
Clement Clarke Moore
An anapest here is "Twas the night".
Dactyl
a metrical unit with stressed-
unstressed-unstressed syllables
There's a lovely contrast between
the skippety dactyl of "Merry mites"
and the surprising, ceremonious
spondee, "Welcome".
—The Guardian Mar 29, 2010Half a
League, Half a League, Half a League,
onward
—The Charge of the Light Brigade,
Alfred Lord Tennyson
Spondee
a metrical unit with stressed-
stressed syllables
"Hot sun" and "cool fire" are both
spondees.
—The Guardian Oct 11, 2010'By the
shore of Gitche Gumee,
By the shining Big-Sea-Water,
—The Song of Hiawatha, Henry
Wadsworth Longfellow
A spondee here is "By the".
Trochee
a metrical unit with stressed-
unstressed syllables
"Beauty" by this usage, is a trochee,
"beautiful" a dactyl, "relate" an
iamb, "intercede" an anapest.
—Paull Franklin BaumTyger! Tyger!
Burning bright
—The Tyger, William Blake
The trochee here is "Burning bright".
Iamb
a metrical unit with unstressed-
stressed syllables
“ ‘Feminine’ brand names, like
Chanel, are often iambs; ‘masculine’
ones, like Black & Decker, tend to be
trochees,” he writes.
—New York Times Jul 26, 2011I have
been one acquainted with the night.
I have walked out in rain -- and back
in rain.
I have outwalked the furthest city
light.
I have looked down the saddest city
lane.
—Acquainted with the Night, Robert
Frost
Sestet