“Poetry is when an
emotion has found
its thought and
the thought has
found words.”
- Robert Frost
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Joe Ault
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• Major types of poetry and how they differ from each
other
• Key Poetic Elements and how to identify them within a
selected poem
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Poetry is a language. It has been written, spoken, and read for
thousands upon thousands of years. Poetry can evoke emotion,
memories, and bring light to new and old ideas. All poetry has
been written by real people with real feelings and thoughts.
Everybody can read poetry, and everyone can write it. There
are messages within poetry about life, love, struggle, happiness,
sadness, fear, and fearlessness. Poetry can represent something
important, or it can mean absolutely nothing at the same time.
Poetry is what you make of it. However, until you have a small
background of information on the different types of poetry and
the different key poetic elements, reading through and
understanding poetry can prove to be quite difficult.
Let’s get started, shall we?
Types of Poetry
Key Poetic Elements
Quiz
Click on the type of poetry and explore its meaning and other
cool stuff.
SONNET
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Sonnet
“The sonnet is one of several forms
of poetry originating in Europe,
mainly Great Britain and Italy and
commonly have 14 lines. The term
"sonnet" derives from the Occitan
word sonet and the Italian word
sonetto, both meaning "little song"
or "little sound.”
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Example Sonnet
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 18
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;
14 Lines
10 Syllables per Line
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 owest,
Nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
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Haiku
“A Japanese lyric verse form having
three unrhymed lines of five, seven,
and five syllables, traditionally
invoking an aspect of nature or the
seasons.”
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The Rose
Donna Brock
No Rhyme
The red blossom bends
Lines of 5, 7, 5
syllables each
and drips its dew to the ground.
Like a tear it falls
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Traditionally about
Nature
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Sestina
“A poem with six stanzas of six lines
and a final triplet, all stanzas
having the same six words at the
line-ends in six different sequences
that follow a fixed pattern, and
with all six words appearing in the
closing three-line envoi.”
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"Sestina d'Inverno" by Anthony Hecht
Here in this bleak city of Rochester,
Where there are twenty-seven words for "snow,"
Not all of them polite, the wayward mind
Basks in some Yucatan of its own making,
Some coppery, sleek lagoon, or cinnamon island
Alive with lemon tints and burnished natives,
And O that we were there. But here the natives
Of this grey, sunless city of Rochester
Have sown whole mines of salt about their land
(Bare ruined Carthage that it is) while snow
Comes down as if The Flood were in the making.
Yet on that ocean Marvell called the mind
An ark sets forth which is itself the mind,
Bound for some pungent green, some shore whose natives
Blend coriander, cayenne, mint in making
Roasts that would gladden the Earl of Rochester
With sinfulness, and melt a polar snow.
It might be well to remember that an island
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Was blessed heaven once, more than an island,
The grand, utopian dream of a noble mind.
In that kind climate the mere thought of snow
Was but a wedding cake; the youthful natives,
Unable to conceive of Rochester,
Made love, and were acrobatic in the making.
Dream as we may, there is far more to making
Do than some wistful reverie of an island,
Especially now when hope lies with the Rochester
Gas and Electric Co., which doesn't mind
Such profitable weather, while the natives
Sink, like Pompeians, under a world of snow.
The one thing indisputable here is snow,
The single verity of heaven's making,
Deeply indifferent to the dreams of the natives,
And the torn hoarding-posters of some island.
Under our igloo skies the frozen mind
Holds to one truth: it is grey, and called Rochester.
No island fantasy survives Rochester,
Where to the natives destiny is snow
That is neither to our mind nor of our making.
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Blank Verse
“Blank Verse is poetry that is
written in unrhymed iambic
pentameter, meaning each line is
written in five beats and the
accents alternate. Blank verse is
often unobtrusive and the iambic
pentameter form often resembles
the rhythms of ordinary speech.
William Shakespeare wrote most
of his plays in blank verse. “
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Excerpt from Macbeth
by
William Shakespeare
Tomorrow, and tomorrow, and tomorrow,
Creeps in this petty pace from day to day,
To the last syllable of recorded time;
And all our yesterdays have lighted fools
The way to dusty death. Out, out, brief candle!
Life's but a walking shadow, a poor player
That struts and frets his hour upon the stage
And then is heard no more: it is a tale
Told by an idiot, full of sound and fury,
Signifying nothing.
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No Rhyme
Iambic
Pentameter
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Limerick
“A kind of humorous verse of five
lines, in which the first, second, and
fifth lines rhyme with each other,
and the third and fourth lines, which
are shorter, form a rhymed
couplet.”
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Limerick
by Mark Twain
A man hired by John Smith and Co.
Loudly declared that he’d tho.
Men that he saw
Dumping dirt near his door
The drivers, therefore, didn’t do.
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5 lines
1st, 2nd, and 5th line
rhyme with each
other
3rd and 4th line form
couplet
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Elegy
“A poem of serious reflection,
typically a lament for the dead.”
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Chidioch Tichborne (1558-1586)
by Francis Duggan
On September the nineteenth 1586 in London Tower
When the bloom of his young life was decaying like a flower
Dying in the cool winds of the early Fall
In words his tragic life he did recall.
Chidioch Tichborne to something beautiful to gave life
In his farewell elegy to Agnes his wife
An elegy still read and popular today
True greatness can be slow for to meet decay.
Sad or depressing
A memory
Accused as being in a failed plot to murder Elizabeth
England's Queen
His best days as a poet he had not seen
Hung drawn and quartered a brutal way to die
Such a death to justice surely gives the lie.
Executed in his twenty eight year even in those times that was
young
But he did not remain as one unsung
His gift of life may have been snatched from him in his prime
But his life story and his elegy have withstood the test of time.
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Ode
“In modern use, a lyric poem,
rhymed or unrhymed, typically
addressed to some person or thing
and usually characterized by lofty
feeling, elaborate form, and
dignified style.”
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Ode to Sir Lucius Gray and Sir H. Morison
by Ben Jonson
Can rhyme if wanted
It is not growing like a tree
In bulk, doth make man better be;
Or standing long an Oak, three hundred year,
To fall a log at last, dry, bald, and sear.
A Lily of a day
Is fairer far, in May
Although it fall and die that night;
It was the plant and flower of light.
In small proportions we just beauties see;
And in short measure, life may perfect be.
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Normally dedictation
to someone or
something
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Villanelle
“A 19-line poem of fixed form
consisting of five tercets and a final
quatrain on two rhymes, with the
first and third lines of the first tercet
repeated alternately as a refrain
closing the succeeding stanzas and
joined as the final couplet of the
quatrain.”
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Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night
by Dylan Thomas
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Old age should burn and rave at close of day;
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Though wise men at their end know dark is right,
Because their words had forked no lightning they
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Good men, the last wave by, crying how bright
Their frail deeds might have danced in a green bay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
Six stanzas
Each stanza is three lines
each
Wild men who caught and sang the sun in flight,
And learn, too late, they grieved it on its way,
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Grave men, near death, who see with blinding sight
Blind eyes could blaze like meteors and be gay,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
And you, my father, there on the sad height,
Curse, bless, me now with your fierce tears, I pray.
Do not go gentle into that good night,
Rage, rage against the dying of the light.
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Click on the term to learn what it means and to see examples.
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Imagery
“The use of vivid or figurative
language to represent objects,
actions, or ideas.”
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From the family tree of old school hip hop
Kick off your shoes and relax your socks
The rhymes will spread just like a pox
Cause the music is live like an electric shock
--Beastie Boys "Intergalactic" From Hello Nasty
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Words which evoke
emotion or any of the
senses of the reader
Let’s the reader
see the image
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Rhyme
“Correspondence of sound between
words or the endings of words, esp.
when these are used at the ends of
lines of poetry.”
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Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the King's horses, And all the King's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again!
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Onomatopoeia
“The formation of a word from a
sound associated with what is
named, such as ‘pop’, ‘fizzle’,
‘oozes’. It sounds like it is read.”
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Crack an Egg
by Denise Rodgers
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Crack an egg.
Stir the butter.
Break the yolk.
Make it flutter.
Stoke the heat.
Hear it sizzle.
Shake the salt,
just a drizzle.
Flip it over,
just like that.
Press it down.
Squeeze it flat.
Pop the toast.
Spread jam thin.
Say the word.
Breakfast's in .
Words that sound, in real life,
just as they are read
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Alliteration
“The occurrence of the same letter
or sound at the beginning of
adjacent or closely connected
words.”
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Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.
A peck of pickled peppers Peter Piper picked.
If Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
How many pickled peppers did Peter Piper
pick?
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Simile
“A figure of speech involving the
comparison of one thing with
another thing of a different kind.”
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A Red, Red Rose
by Robert Burns
O My Luve's like a red, red rose,
That's newly sprung in June;
O My Luve's like the melodie
That's sweetly played in tune.
Uses the word “like” or “as” as
comparison words
As fair art thou, my bonnie lass,
So deep in luve am I;
And I will luve thee still, my dear,
Till a' the seas gang dry, my dear
While the sands o' life shall run.
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And fare thee weel, my only luve,
And fare thee weel, awhile!
And I will come again, my luve
Tho' it ware ten thousand mile!
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Caesura
“A pause near the middle of a line.”
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An Essay on Man
by Alexander Pope
Notice the pauses
right in the middle
of the lines
Know then thyself II, presume not God to scan;
The proper study of Mankind II is Man.
Plac'd on this isthmus of a middle state,
A being darkly wise, and rudely great:
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Enjambment
“The continuation of a syntactic unit
from one line of verse into the next
line without a pause.”
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Trees
by Joyce Kilmer
I think that I shall never see
A poem lovely as a tree.
Notice how the yellow words
begin on one line and continue on
to the next line without any pause
or punctuation
A tree whose hungry mouth is prest
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast;
A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;
A tree that may in summer wear
A nest of robins in her hair;
Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.
Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
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Diction
“The choice and use of words and
phrases in speech or writing.”
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The Road Not Taken
By Robert Frost
Diction is simply
the word choice
that the writer
decides to use
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.
And both that morning equally lay
In leaves no step had trodden black.
Oh, I kept the first for another day!
Yet knowing how way leads on to way,
I doubted if I should ever come back.
Then took the other, as just as fair,
And having perhaps the better claim,
Because it was grassy and wanted wear;
Though as for that the passing there
Had worn them really about the same.
I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.
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Metaphor
“A figure of speech in which a word
or phrase is applied to an object or
action to which it is not literally
applicable.”
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“All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players
They have their exits and their entrances.”
Notice how
Shakespeare
compares the world
to a stage
William Shakespeare
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Now Let’s see what you have learned. The goal is to answer four
out of five questions correctly.
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A ____________ is a term used to compare two things using the
words “like” or “as”.
A.
B.
C.
D.
Metaphor
Caesura
Diction
Simile
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WRONG, try again
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Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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THAT IS CORRECT! GREAT JOB!
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NEXT QUESTION
Which type of poetry is this an example of?
Without flowing wine
How to enjoy lovely
Cherry blossoms?
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A. Limerick
B. Sonnet
C. Haiku
D. Ode
Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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THAT IS CORRECT! GREAT JOB!
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NEXT QUESTION
Wrong, try again
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TRY AGAIN
Click on the enjambment in the following poem.
Dream Deferred by Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
Like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore-And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over-like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
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Or does it explode?
Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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THAT IS CORRECT! GREAT JOB!
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NEXT QUESTION
Wrong, try again
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A caesura is ______________?
A.
B.
C.
D.
A comparison of two things that are not alike.
A poem that has no rhyme.
When the poet uses iambic pentameter in the first line.
A pause of break in the middle of a line of poetry.
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Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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TRY AGAIN
THAT IS CORRECT! GREAT JOB!
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NEXT QUESTION
What type of poetry is the
following poem?
There is another sky
by Emily Dickinson
There is another sky,
Ever serene and fair,
And there is another sunshine,
Though it be darkness there;
Never mind faded forests, Austin,
Never mind silent fields Here is a little forest,
Whose leaf is ever green;
Here is a brighter garden,
Where not a frost has been;
In its unfading flowers
I hear the bright bee hum:
Prithee, my brother,
Into my garden come!
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A. Limerick
B. Sonnet
C. Blank Verse
D. None of the above
Wrong, try again
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TRY AGAIN
Wrong, try again
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Wrong, try again
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TRY AGAIN
THAT IS CORRECT! GREAT JOB!
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FINISH
You now have a pretty solid knowledge base on the types of
different poetry and some of the key poetic elements.
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