Exam Practice
Question Number 4: Structure
Coming up:
•
•
•
•
What is structure?
Stanzas
Rhyme Scheme
Step back from the poem and look for any
other structural devices
• Beginning, Middle, and End
What is structure?
The structure is the way the poet organized his or her poem into
different sections. It involves the sequencing of ideas.
Think about the structure of a paragraph: it may have a topic
sentence, then a series of sentences that support the topic sentence
with specifics, then a concluding sentence.
Think about the structure of an essay: it may have a paragraph that
introduces the topic and states a position or thesis, then several
paragraphs that each take a branch of the thesis and tries to convince
the reader that they’re true, and then a concluding paragraph that
relates all the branches to the thesis and offers an insight that will give
the reader a better understanding of the topic.
Stanzas
Now let’s think about a poem. Instead of paragraphs, poems
are organized into stanzas.
In the same way that each paragraph in an essay fulfills a
purpose, each stanza accomplishes something.
Take a step back and look at the overall organization of the
stanzas. With a hypothetical poem in mind, perhaps the first
stanza offers a sad outlook on a topic. Maybe the next gives a
metaphor that emphasizes the sadness of it. Maybe the next
stanza offers a metaphor that has a positive connotation now.
Maybe the last stanza ponders the fact that the topic is not
sad after all. The organization of stanzas leads the reader
from looking at the topic in a conventionally sad way to a new
outlook that is positive and more uplifting.
Example: Looking at Stanzas
The Bird
by Patrick Lane
The bird you captured is dead.
I told you it would die
but you would not learn
from my telling. You wanted
to cage a bird in yours hands
and learn to fly.
Listen again.
You must not handle birds.
They cannot fly through your fingers.
You are not a nest
and a feather is
not made of blood and bone.
Only words
can fly for you like birds
on the wall of the sun.
A bird is a poem
that talks about the end of cages.
Stanza Structure
For “The Bird”, you might point out that it’s organized in three
stanzas, so it has a very clear, traditional beginning, middle, and
end. The series of stanzas lead the reader gradually towards a
final revelation that the bird is a metaphor for a poem and a
symbol of freedom. At the start, the first stanza scolds the
listener. The speaker depicts the listener as foolish; it is absurd
to think you can learn to fly by holding onto a bird. The second
stanza follows the scolding with correction, instruction, and
reasoning about why we don’t handle birds. It is not until the
end that the poem reveals its secret: that the bird actually
symbolizes freedom. Now the point of the speaker’s scolding
and instruction is revealed as the poet’s method for showing
that the concepts of capture and freedom are diametrically
opposed. It is, therefore, absurd to think you can achieve
freedom through constraint.
No stanzas?
What if the poem is all in one piece?
Let me not to the marriage of true minds
Admit impediments. Love is not love
Which alters when it alteration finds,
Or bends with the remover to remove:
O no; it is an ever-fixed mark,
That looks on tempests, and is never shaken;
It is the star to every wandering bark,
Whose worth's unknown, although his height be taken.
Love's not Time's fool, though rosy lips and cheeks
Within his bending sickle's compass come;
Love alters not with his brief hours and weeks,
But bears it out even to the edge of doom.
If this be error and upon me proved,
I never writ, nor no man ever loved.
Is there a rhyme scheme?
The rhyme scheme of Sonnet 116 forms a
pattern that reveals a grouping of the first four
lines (abab), then another grouping of four lines
(cdcd), a third grouping of four lines (efef), and
then two lines (gg). You can discuss the purpose
of these groupings the same way you would
stanzas.
Structure by Rhyme Scheme
Sonnet 116 is structured by its rhyme scheme. It has three grouping of four
lines each, and a couplet on the end. The first four lines defined by the rhyme
pattern abab introduces the topic under examination: true love. It then tells
the reader what love is not: changeable. The second four-line grouping,
cdcd, contrasts the first by telling the reader what true love is: unalterable. It
does this with storm imagery, showing love cannot be moved or harmed by it.
The next grouping, efef, heightens the drama of the argument with a
gruesome scenario depicting Love’s unwavering bravery as he faces execution
by Time. The final couplet is an abrupt break in the horrific drama with
lighthearted revelation of the poet himself: Shakespeare addressing the
audience directly, asserting the validity of his argument that true love is
unalterable.
No rhyme scheme?
What if there’s no rhyme scheme?
Take a step back. Is there some other way the
poem is structured?
Is there another structural device?
The poem on the next slide does have a rhyme
scheme, so the structure could be discussed as
was previously done. However, this next poem
does have another structural device.
Can you see another structural device?
Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s
Sonnet 43
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways.
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight
For the ends of being and ideal grace.
I love thee to the level of every day’s
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light.
I love thee freely, as men strive for right.
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise.
I love thee with the passion put to use
In my old griefs, and with my childhood’s faith.
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose
With my lost saints. I love thee with the breath,
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose,
I shall but love thee better after death.
Structure of Sonnet 43
I chose this poem as an example of other
structural devices because this one has a clear
question and answer structure. The first line is a
rhetorical question (or more specifically,
hypophora). The rest of the poem is the answer
to the question.
Did you find any others that I may have missed?
Other structural devices?
You might find things like
• parallel structure (Recall “I Hate that Drum’s
Discordant Sound”)
• contrast
• shifts or abrupt changes in tone
• shifts between concrete and abstract images
• groupings of types of metaphors
What if you can’t find another
structural device?!
Don’t panic. Here’s your fallback plan: The
poem most certainly has....
A beginning, middle, and an end.
This is the most fundamental structure of writing.
• What does the poem accomplish at the start of
the poem? What topic is introduced?
• What is the poem accomplishing in the middle?
• What is the punch at the end. Is it a deepening of
our understanding of what’s been established? Is
it a surprising switch in tone or perspective?
Structure
You have a plan and a back-up plan. You’re good
to go when it comes to talking about the
structure of the poem!