What is poetry?
Notes
Poetry is…
 The use of language in creative ways to
evoke emotion.
 Meant to be both read and heard.
 Heavily reliant on techniques like rhythm,
rhyme, metaphor, simile, symbolism, etc.
Poetry Myths
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All poems must rhyme. FALSE!
All poems are sad or about love. FALSE!
No one writes poetry anymore. FALSE!
Poetry is un-cool. FALSE!
Poetry includes…
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Poems
Song Lyrics/ Rap
Slam poetry
Rhymed and Non-rhymed
I Am Music
Lyrics By: Common
People say I got soul; look at all the records I hold,
The lives I've affected, connect and control.
With me in your basement, your mind got blown.
I provide the vibe to keep the dancers on poles.
Through me the black experience is glorious told
From a school that's old bold. So I rock gold
And platinum. So cats, I hold notes and cash for them.
On streets I rap for them, in ghettos I blast for them,
Mash with them, at the party and all.
Peep the universal language that's embodying all.
Put the Billie Holiday, Bob Marley in y'all.
Y'all feel most high when I be in y'all’s system.
With the rhythm, I up-jump the boogie.
Shame I rely on record labels to push me.
Since G. Bush, I been y'all way to escape
Through eight-tracks, wax CDs and tapes.
I am music.
Introduction to Poetry
By: Billy Collins
I ask them to take a poem
and hold it up to the light
like a color slide
or press an ear against its hive.
I say drop a mouse into a poem
and watch him probe his way out,
or walk inside the poem's room
and feel the walls for a light switch.
I want them to waterski
across the surface of a poem
waving at the author's name on the shore.
But all they want to do
is tie the poem to a chair with rope
and torture a confession out of it.
They begin beating it with a hose
to find out what it really means.
i carry your heart
By: e e cummings
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate, my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world, my true)
and it's you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life; which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
What is they feedin’ our kids?
By: Idris Goodwin
 Slam Poet
 Meant to be heard, not read
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IENR53
OgcFY
Sonnet #18
By: William Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course
untrimmed:
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st,
Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his
shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st,
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
Should I say you’re like a summer day?
You’re prettier and even better, calmer:
Because sometimes it gets windy and the buds
on the trees get shaken off
And sometimes summer doesn't last very long
Sometimes it's too hot
And sometimes the sun isn’t so bright.
And beauty fades
Either because of accidents or old age.
BUT your sunshine is forever.
You won’t lose your beauty.
Death will never brag that he owns you
You will be eternal.
As long as men can breathe and see
Then this poem lives, and it keeps your beauty
alive.
In Class Assignment
1. What surprised you about these
poems?
2. Which poem did you like best?
Write two sentences telling me why you liked
this poem.
3. Which poem did you like the least?
Write two sentences telling me why it was your
least favorite.