Poetry
Poems
Poetry Terms
Myths:
Always Rhymes
Always Boring
Always About Love
Always Hate It
Poetry
• Literature that uses few words to express
feelings and ideas; painting a picture with
words
• Written to be shared
• May or may not rhyme
Poem Types
• Shape Poetry • Grammar Poetry
– Name-shape – Diamonte
– Peace Poem • Ballads & Lyrics
• Syllable Poetry – Limerick
– Haiku – Songs
– Cinquain – Epics
Prose
Shape Poetry
–Name-shape: Poem about the
shape of your name
–Peace Poem: Poem about your
how you feel about peace (peace
on earth, peace in the world, peace
in communities, peace in our
homes, etc.)
Syllable Poetry
– Haiku: a Japanese form of poetry with 3
unrhymed lines of 5-7-5 syllables
– Cinquain: a Japanese adapted version a
five-lined poem which can be one of the
following:
• A grammar poem: lines contain 1=subject,
2=2 adj, 3=
• A syllable poem
• A word poem
Grammar Poetry
–Diamonte:
Ballads & Lyrics
– Limerick: a humorous poem of five lines with a
rhyme scheme of aabba
– Song (lyrics): designed to be sung where a
single emotional element (1 subject) which
reminds the reader/listener of their own
experiences
– Ballad: a narrative poem in which the story
usually consists of folklore or legends
– Epic: poetry celebrating the deeds of some hero
– Prose: Ordinary or regular writing without
metrical structure
Devices & Figurative Language
• Alliteration • Personification
• Form • Repetition
• Imagery • Rhyme
• Lines • Rhythm
• Meaning • Simile
• Metaphor • Stanza
• Meter • Symbolism
• Mood • Tone
• Onomatopoeia
Alliteration
• Noun + Verb + Noun http://library.thinkquest.org/J011
– Dogs destroy dinosaurs 2392/alliterationclassics.html
• Add adjectives and adverbs
– Dirty dreaming DOGS dizzily DESTROY dangerous
damp dreary DINOSAURS.
• Add conjunctions and preps/prep phrases
– Dirty dreaming dogs dizzily destroy dangerous damp
dreary dinosaurs down disgustingly damp dungeons
during dismal December days.
• Assonance: repetition of vowel sounds
• Consonance: repetition of consonant sounds
Form
• The way it looks on the page
• Varying types from free verse to limericks
to narrative poetry, etc. http://thewordshop.tripod
.com/forms.html
Imagery
• Vivid descriptions of things seen. Imagery
is related to sensory language, which
appeals to all the senses of sight, sound,
smell, taste, and touch.
• Can be any combination of the senses
http://www.maryfumento.com/
poetry/imagery.html
Lines
• Lines are similar to sentences.
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
5 The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
http://www.arcticwebsite.co
m/ServiceCremation.html
Meaning
Metaphor
• His eyes were the “Fog,” by Carl Sandburg
blue sky.
• The umbrella was a The fog comes
roof over my head. On little cat feet.
It sits looking
• A Metaphor is Over harbor and city
comparing 2 unlike
things without using On silent haunches
the words like or as… And then moves on.
Meter
• reoccurring pattern of Poems
stressed and
unstressed syllables Practice
• Iambic pentameter: http://www.flashcardexchange.
com/flashcards/view/277829
10 syllables per line
Notes
http://www.cummingsstudy
guides.net/xmeter.html
More Notes
http://www.writing.upenn.edu/
~afilreis/88/meter.html
Mood
Onomatopoeia
• Words that sound like Cafeteria
their meanings; words
which imitate sound Boom!
• hiss, buzz, rattle, Went the food
bang, boom, swoosh, trays.
zip, pop, sizzle, Clap! Clap!
gurgle, crackle, snap Goes the teacher.
http://library.thinkquest.org/J01
12392/omomatopoea.html
Personification
• Giving an animal or Two Sunflowers Move in
an object human the Yellow Room.
characteristics
"Ah, William, we're
• Examples: The wind
howled in anger weary of weather,"
around the house. said the sunflowers,
– The stapler bit the shining with dew.
piece of paper "Our traveling habits
fiercely. have tired us.
– The armchair Can you give us a room
hugged me as I sat with a view?"
down. http://library.thinkquest.org/J0112
392/personificationclassics.html
Repetition
• Repeating of words, Life Doesn’t Frighten Me
phrases, lines, or by Maya Angelou
stanzas (repeats a line)
• Example: from The http://www.swaraj.org/shiksh
antar/life_mayaangelou.htm
Cremation of Sam Whatif
McGee by Robert
Service By Shel Silverstein
(repeats a word)
http://www.qu-i-
x.com/whatif.html
Rhyme
• rhyme: similar ending sounds between
words
• end rhyme: words at end of lines that
rhyme (couplets)
• internal rhyme: words which rhyme
within the same line
He’d salivate and slobber
from Alex’s Allergy as his nose began to twitch.
by Kenn Nesbitt
He’d squirm and say his body felt
like one gigantic itch.
http://www.gigglepoetry.com/poem.aspx?PoemID=630&CategoryID=29
Rhythm
• A pattern of stressed and
unstressed syllables.
• Synonym for “meter”.
“We Real Cool” by
Gwendolyn Brooks
We REAL COOL.
We LEFT SCHOOL.
We LURK LATE.
We STRIKE STRAIGHT.
We…
Simile
His eyes were as blue “Surprise,” by Jean
as the sky. Little
His eyes were blue like I feel like the ground
the sky. in winter,
Hard, cold, dark,
dead, unyielding.
• A simile is
comparing 2 unlike
things using the http://library.thinkquest.org/J011
words like or as… 2392/simileclassics.html
Stanza
• Stanzas are like paragraphs.
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
5 The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
http://www.arcticwebsite.co
m/ServiceCremation.html
Symbolism
The Lightening Is A The lightening is a yellow Fork
Yellow Fork” From tables in the sky
by Emily Dickinson By inadvertent fingers dropt
(1830 - 1886) the awful Cutlery
http://209.85.165.104/searc Of Mansion never quite
h?q=cache:0nX_XuWU5lsJ: disclosed
faculty.rcoe.appstate.edu/s
mithtw/Craft_Minilessons/R And never quite concealed
E_3150_s03/Donna%2520
Miller_Craft.doc+symbolism The Apparatus of the Dark
+in+poetry&hl=en&ct=clnk&
cd=7&gl=us To ignorance revealed.
Tone
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