Poetry Terms

Allegory

An extended metaphor in which the characters, places, and objects in a narrative carry figurative meaning. Often an allegory’s meaning is religious, moral, or historical in nature.

Alliteration

The repetition of identical consonant sounds, most often the sounds beginning words, in close proximity. Example: pensive poets, nattering nabobs of negativism.

Allusion

Unacknowledged reference and quotations that authors assume their readers will recognize.

Anagram

A word spelled out by rearranging the letters of another word; for example, “The teacher gapes at the mounds of exam pages lying before her.”

Anaphora

Repetition of the same word or phrase at the beginning of a line throughout a work or the section of a work. Example: Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s famous “I Have a Dream” speech, which uses anaphora not only in its oft-quoted “I have a dream” refrain but throughout, as in this passage when he repeats the phrase “go back to:” “Go back to Mississippi, go back to Alabama, go back to South Carolina, go back to Georgia, go back to Louisiana, go back to the slums and ghettos of our northern cities, knowing that somehow this situation can and will be changed.”

Anthropomorphism

A form of personification in which human qualities are attributed to anything inhuman, usually a god, animal, object, or concept. Example: Vachel Lindsay’s poem “What the Rattlesnake Said,” where a snake describes the fears of his imagined prey

Archetype

A basic model from which copies are made; a prototype

Assonance

The repetition of identical vowel sounds in different words in close proximity. Example: deep green sea.

Blank Verse

poetry that does not rhyme but follows a regular meter.

Caesura

A short but definite pause used for effect within a line of poetry.

Connotation

the implied or suggested meaning associated with a word or phrase.

Couplet

a two-line stanza, rhymed, generally at the end of a poem, and generally used to resolve the poem

Denotation

the dictionary meaning of a word

Elegy

a form of poetry in which the poet or speaker expresses grief, sadness, or loss.

End-stopped line

A line ending in a full pause, usually indicated with a period or semicolon

Enjambment (or enjambement)

A line having no end punctuation but running over to the next line.

Epic

a long, often book-length, narrative in verse form that retells the heroic journey of a single person, or group of persons.

Figurative Meaning

the associative or connotative meaning of a word, phrase, or poem.

Free Verse (Open Form)

open form poetry not dictated by an established form or meter and often influenced by the rhythms of speech.

Haiku

a form that originated in Japan, is traditionally composed of three lines with seventeen syllables, written in a 5/7/5 syllable count, and often focuses on images from nature.

Hyperbole (Overstatement)

Hyperbole is exaggeration for effect.

Imagery

language in a poem representing a sensory experience, including sight, sounds, tastes, smells, and sensations of touch.

Internal rhyme

An exact rhyme (rather than rhyming vowel sounds, as with assonance) within a line of poetry: "Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary."

Litotes (Understatement)

litotes is understatement for effect, often used for irony

Metaphor

A comparison between two unlike things, this describes one thing as if it were something else. Does not use "like" or "as" for the comparison (see simile).

Nature Poetry

poetry that engages with, describes, or considers the natural world.

Onomatopoeia

A blending of consonant and vowel sounds designed to imitate or suggest the activity being described. Example: buzz, slurp.

Paradox

A rhetorical figure embodying a seeming contradiction that is nonetheless true.

Personification

Attributing human characteristics to nonhuman things or abstractions

Poetry

A form of writing vital to culture, art, and life.

Point of View

The perspective or viewpoint of the speaker in a poem.

Rhyme

The repetition of identical concluding syllables in different words, most often at the ends of lines. Example: June, moon.

Rhyme Scheme

The rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhymes followed by the words at the end of each line in a poem or song. Example: A,B,A,B or A,A,B,B

Rhythm

The recurrence of specific sounds based on long and short patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables. Beats provide the rhythm in poetry as rhythm is determined by the poem's tempo and structure.

Saudade

A Portuguese term expressing nostalgia or yearning for something that might have been.

Simile

A direct comparison between two dissimilar things; uses "like" or "as" to state the terms of the comparison.

Stanza

a grouping of lines that forms the main unit in a poem. The meters and rhymes are usually repeating or systematic

Synesthesia

A rhetorical figure that describes one sensory impression in terms of a different sense, or one perception in terms of a totally different or even opposite feeling.  Example: "darkness visible" "green thought"

Syntax

Word order and sentence structure

Theme

An idea that recurs in or pervades a work of art or literature

Tone

A literary device that conveys the author’s attitude toward the subject, speaker, or audience of a poem

Volta

the “turning” point of a sonnet or poem