Poetry Terms
English 12
Couplet
• Two lines of poetry which rhyme
Little Bow Peep
Has lost her sheep
Alliteration
• The repetition of consonant sounds in a line of
poetry
• Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers
Assonance
• The repetition of vowel sounds in a line of
poetry
• Like a diamond in sky
Oxymoron
• When two words which mean the opposite
are put together
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Jumbo shrimp
The sound of silence
Loving hate
Blinding sight
Simile
• A comparison of two things which uses “like”,
“as”, or “than”
• She swims like a fish
• He’s faster than a speeding bullet
• She as sly as a fox
Hyperbole
• A huge exaggeration for effect (not meant to
deceive)
• I’m so hungry I could eat a horse
• I must have cried a zillion tears
• I have a ton of homework
Personification
• When human qualities are given to an
inanimate (non-living) object
• The sun smiled down on us
• The trees danced in the wind
Metaphor
• A direct comparison between two things (does
not use a comparison word)
• Love is a rose.
• The garden hose is a snake in the grass.
Onomatopoeia
• Sound words
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Ouch
Ah choo
Biff, boom, bam
Baaa, moo, cheep cheep
Meter
• The beat or rhythm of a line of poetry
“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day”
Imagery
• Using the five senses (sight, sound, taste,
touch, smell) to fully describe something
• The aroma of rotten eggs wafting up from the corner of
the room where a pair of damp sweat socks lay
forgotten, brought the acrid taste of bile into his
mother’s mouth.
Analogy
• Using something simple to explain something
complex
• The heart works like a pump
Anachronism
• A person, place or object out of its natural
order in time
• An automobile in a story about ancient Rome
• Shakespeare’s use of dollars in Macbeth, in a time
where money did not exist
Antithesis
• Sharply opposing ideas place in parallel syntax
• More light and light it grows
• More dark and dark my woes
Allusion
• Making reference to a famous person, place or
thing from mythology, the Bible, history, or
Shakespeare
• He strode across the room, a modern Napoleon
• He was the Jordan of the basketball court
Consonance
• Differing vowel sounds between repeating
consonant sounds
• Short shirt
• Leave love
• The repetition of consonant sounds at
the ends of words only
• East – west
• Hid - bed
Connotation
• The associations we make with words (as
opposed to their literal meanings)
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A house
An estate
An abode
A mansion
A shack
Denotation
• The dictionary definition of a word
• House, mansion, estate, abode, etc: a residence; a
place to live
Cacophony
• Harsh or jarring sounds
Dissonance
Another word for cacophony
Euphony
• Pleasant, or pleasing sounds
• Silence
• smooth
Stanza
• A group of lines of poetry (like a paragraph)
Whose woods these are I think I know
His house is in the village though
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his wood fill up with snow
Quatrain
• A four line stanza
Archetype
• A commonly used symbol in literature
• A dove or an olive branch represent peace
Octave & Sestet
• Octave:
• Eight lines of poetry
• The first 8 lines of a Petrarchan sonnet
• Sestet:
• Six lines of poetry
• The last six lines of a Petrarchan sonnet
Pathetic Fallacy
• When nature reflects the mood
• When there is a storm during a battle scene in Macbeth
Paradox
• A statement which at first appears
contradictory, but which is actually true
• Parental punishment is an expression of love
Apostrophe
• A type of personification, where an inanimate
object or idea is addressed as though present
• Death be not proud, though some have called thee
mighty and dreadful, thou art not so.
Conceit
• Also called an extended metaphor
The fog creeps in on little cat feet
Sits looking over harbour and city
And then moves on
juxtaposition
• Placing words / ideas side by side for effect
My name is Ozymandias, King of kings,
Look on my works ye Mighty and despair.”
And round the decay of that colossal wreck
The lone and level sands stretch far away.
By placing the bragging words of Ozymandias next to the
description of the broken statue in the desert, the poet creates
irony
Diction
• The choice of words
• Ie. Slang, jargon, legalese
• Ie. Curley: “By Christ, he’s gonna talk when he’s spoke
to. What the hell are you getting’ into it for?”
Literal Language
• Language that is straight-forward where
meaning is clear.
• The man angrily yelled at his son to close the car door.
Figurative Language
• Fanciful language used to describe where
interpretation is necessary
• Analogy, simile, metaphor, personification, hyperbole,
etc. are examples
• Ie. The man waspishly asked his son, “Did you grow up
in a barn?” as they exited the car.
Iambic Pentameter
• A line of poetry which contains five iambic (an
unstressed followed by a stressed syllable)
feet.
• Shall I – compare – thee to – a sum - mer’s
day?
Internal rhyme
• When a word in the middle of the line rhymes
with a word at the end of the line.
– Once upon a midnight DREARY, while I pondered weak and
WEARY"
– "While I nodded, nearly NAPPING, suddenly there came a
TAPPING”
Parallelism
• When items are listed in parallel structure
• Ie. Peter drives quickly and aggressively.
• Ie. I love skiing, hiking, and biking.
Pathos
• When an author purposely
arouses feelings of pity in the
reader
• Ie. "Hillary Clinton used a
moment of brilliantly staged
emotion to win the New
Hampshire Democratic primary . .
.. As she answered questions in a
diner on the morning before the
election, Mrs. Clinton's voice
began to waver and crack when
she said: 'It's not easy. . . . This is
very personal for me.'
Refrain
• A chorus that is repeated throughout the
poem
• Ie. Rage rage against the dying of the light
Rhyme scheme
• A pattern of rhymes with a poem
• Ie. A Shakespearean sonnet has an abab cdcd efef gg
rhyme scheme
Stream of consciousness
• When a poem is a series of thoughts and
phrases directly out of the author’s head
• Ie. The Lovesong of J. Alfred Prufrock
Tone
• The atmosphere of the poem
• Ie. Happy, bittersweet, depressed, pensive, etc.
Voice
• The persona created by the poet
• Ie. The passionate shepherd is a lonely shepherd lad
who just wants a girl to love him and come live with
him