Poetry terms

hyperbole

figure of speech that uses exaggeration to express strong emotion or to create

a comic effect (also known as: overstatement)

atmosphere

the mood or feeling created in a piece of writing

simile

figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things, using a word

such as like, as, resembles or than

imagery

language that appeals to the senses (sight, sound, touch, taste, smell)

tone

the attitude the writer takes toward the audience, a subject, or a character

allusion

- a reference to a statement, a person, a place, or an event from literature,

history, religion, mythology, politics, sports, science, or pop culture

assonance

- the repetition of similar vowel sounds that are followed by different

consonant sounds, especially in words close together in a poem

meter

generally regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in poetry

ballad

a song or songlike poem that tells a story

diction

the part of literary analysis that focuses on an author’s vocabulary and word choices

enjambment

when one line of poetry ends without a pause or any punctuation and

free verse

poetry that does not have a regular meter or rhyme scheme

onomatopoeia

use of a word whose sound imitates or suggests its meaning (crackle, pop,

fizz, click, zoom, chirp)

stanza

group of consecutive lines in a poem that form a single unit

verse

a single line of metrical poetry

refrain

repeated word, phrase, line, or group of lines

couplet

two consecutive lines of poetry that rhyme

quatrain

a four-line stanza or poem or a group of four lines unified by a rhyme scheme

slant rhyme

when words sound similar but do not rhyme exactly (also called

approximate rhyme, half rhyme, imperfect rhyme)

sonnet

fourteen-line lyric poem that is usually written in iambic pentameter and that has one

of several rhyme schemes

rhetorical question

a question asked for effect or emphasis that is not expected to be

answered

apostrophe

a technique by which a writer addresses an inanimate object, an idea, or a

person who is either dead or absent

inversion

the reversal of the normal word order in a sentence or phrase

catalog

a list of things, people, or events

paradox

a statement that appears self-contradictory but that reveals a kind of truth

metaphor

a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two unlike things

without the use of such specific words of comparison as like, as, than, or resembles

vernacular

the language spoken by the people who live in a particular locality

symbol

person, place, thing, or event that stands for itself and for something beyond itself

as well

alliteration

the repetition of the same or very similar consonant sounds in words that are

close together

theme

the central idea of a work of literature; what a text teaches about life or the way the

world works

personification

a type of metaphor in which a nonhuman thing or quality is talked about as

if it were human