LET’S LEARN ABOUT SOME POETRY!

“Poetry lifts the veil from the hidden

beauty of the world”-Percy Bysshe Shelley

Organizational Devices in Poetry

Verse—A line of poetry

Couplet—Two lines of rhymed poetry.

Stanza—An organizational pattern of verse.

Quatrain—A four line stanza or poem.

FORM

Form is the poem’s structure, or the way the words are arranged on the page.

Lines are group into stanzas, which function like paragraphs in prose. Each stanza plays a part in conveying the overall message of the poem.

Characteristics: follows fixed rules, such as a specified number of lines

Has a regular pattern of rhythm and/or rhythm

Forms: epic, ode, ballad, sonnet, haiku, limerick

Characteristics: does not follow established rules of form

Does not have a regular pattern of rhythm and may not rhyme at all

May use unconventional spelling, punctuation, and grammar

Forms: free verse, concrete poetry

Traditional Organic

Surgeons must be very careful

When they take the knife!

Underneath their fine incisions

Stirs the Culprit—Life! (Emily Dickinson)

1(aleaffalls)oneliness

(ee cummings “A Leaf Falls on Loneliness)

Traditional Organic

SONNET (TRADITIONAL)

Made up of 14 lines, commonly written in iambic pentameter. There are two types: Petrarchan and Shakespearean. A Shakespearean sonnet consists of three quatrains and a final couplet. The rhyme scheme is abab cdcd efef gg.

A Petrarchan, or Italian, sonnet rhyme scheme is abba abba cde cde. This consists of an octave (8 lines) and a sestet (6 lines). The octave usually introduces a problem and the sestet provides some sort of solution.

POETIC ELEMENTS

Like music, language has rhythm. The pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in each line creates the rhythm. Rhyme can occur at the end of the lines as end rhyme or within the lines as internal rhyme.

A regular pattern of rhythm is called a meter. A regular pattern of rhyme is called a rhyme scheme.

Repetition A sound, word, phrase, or

line that is repeated for emphasis and unity.

Alliterationrepetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words

Assonancerepetition of vowel sounds in words that don’t end with the same consonant

Consonancerepetition of consonant sounds within and at the end of words

“Back off from this poem. Back off from this

poem.”

“Which circle slowly like a silken swish”

“deep-eyed and deer in herds”

Whose nest is in a watered shoot

Sound device Example

METER

To identify the poem’s meter, you have to break each line into smaller units, called feet. A foot consists of one stressed syllable and one or two unstressed ones. Look at the type and the number of feet in each line and combine them to define the meter, for example, iambic pentameter.

Types of feet:Iamb (reSIST)- consists of an

unstressed followed by a stressed syllable

Trochee (ABsent)- consists of a stressed followed by an unstressed syllable

Spondee (GOAL LINE)- consists of two stressed syllables

Number of feet:trimeter: (3)

tetrameter: (4)pentameter: (5)

^ / ^ / ^ / ^ / ^ /         

That time | of year | thou mayst | in me | be hold |

IMAGERY AND FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

Figurative language communicates meanings beyond the literal meaning of words. Simile, metaphor, hyperbole, personification, and onomatopoeia are some examples.

Figurative language is more descriptive and evokes a stronger emotion.

Literal: He was angryFigurative: He burned with anger.

TERMS TO KNOW...Simile

a comparison b/w two unlike things, containing the words like or as

Metaphor

a comparison b/w two unlike things without like or as

Personification

a description of an object, an animal, or a place in human terms,

Hyperbole

an exaggeration for emphasis or humorous effect

My heart is like singing bird.

The assignment was a breeze.

This poem has taken in many victims

I’m so hungry that I could eat a horse.