Poets have many tools they use to add to the poem’s sound, meaning, and emotional effect on the reader.

• Poetry is the art of expressing one’s thoughts in verse.
• It uses few words to convey the message.
• It is meant to be read aloud.
• Poetry arouses our emotions.
• Poems use imagery or figures of speech to explain feelings or to create a mental picture or ideal.
• These suggest actions or mood.
• Many poems have a specific rhyme scheme
• Poems can rhyme or not rhyme.

POET SPEAKER
• The poet is the author of the poem.
• The speaker of the poem is the “narrator” of the poem.

• LINES
-A single line in a poem.
-Often organized into stanzas.
-2 lines is a couplet.
-3 lines is a triplet or tercert.
-4 lines is a quatrain.
-5 lines is a quinrain or a cinquain.
-6 lines is a sestet.
-8 lines is a octet.
• “To a Snowflake”
1. Hello Little Snowflake!
2. Where are all your friends?
3. Should I expect a lot of them
4 . Before the morning ends?
5. I love it when you come to me
6. and you all fall down together,
7. and I get dressed to visit you,
8. toasty warm in cold, cold weather.
The poem above has 8 lines.
The lines are organized into quatrains.

• STANZA
-A group of lines.
-Often have 4,5, or 6 lines.
-2 line stanzas are called couplets.
-Usually develops one idea.
-Give poems structure.
-Emphasizes different ideas.
-Beginning a new stanza often signals the beginning of a new image, thought, or idea.
• “First and Last” by David
McCord
1. A tadpole hasn’t a pole at all,
And he doesn’t live in a hole in the wall.
2. You’ve got it wrong: a polecat’s not a cat on a pole. And I’ll tell you what:
3. A bullfrog’s never a bull; and how could a cowbird be a cow?
Four Stanzas in Couplets
4. A kingbird , though, is a kind of king, and he chases a crow like anything.
Each Stanza Signals a
New Image

• RHYME AND RHYME
SCHEME
-Words rhyme when they have the same sound.
-Poems often use rhymes at the end of lines.
-Rhyme schemes are patterns of rhymes in a poem.
-Poets use rhymes to add a musical sound to their poems.
• “Ten Minutes Till the
Bus” by David L.
Harrison
Ten whole minutes
Till the bus,
Scads of time,
What’s the fuss?
Two to dress,
One to flush,
Two to eat,
One to brush.
That leaves four
To catch the bus,
Scads of time,
What’s the fuss?

The Germ by Ogden Nash
A mighty creature is the germ,
Though smaller than the pachyderm.
His customary dwelling place
Is deep within the human race.
His childish pride he often pleases
By giving people strange diseases.
Do you, my poppet, feel infirm?
You probably contain a germ.
c a b c a a a b

• RHYTHM
Patterns of beats or a series of stressed and unstressed syllables in a poem.
Poets create rhythm by using words in which parts are emphasized or not emphasized.
The yellow highlighted parts of the poem show what’s stressed.
• From “Windy Nights” by
Robert Louis Stevenson
When ev er the moon and stars are set ,
When ev er the wind is high ,
All night long in the dark and wet ,
A man goes rid ing by .
Late in the night when fires are out,
Why does he gal lop and gal lop about ?
U /U U / U /
Whenever the wind is high
Stressed = Unstressed =
/ U

• A word at the end of one line rhymes with a word at the end of another line
Hector the Collector
Collected bits of string.
Collected dolls with broken heads
And rusty bells that would not ring.

• A word inside a line rhymes with another word on the same line.
Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary.
From “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe

• FREE VERSE
-Poetry written without a regular rhyme, rhythm, and form.
-Sounds natural, like everyday conversation.
-Poets use free verse because it allows them to experiment with the shapes and sounds in their poetry.
• “Blossoms” by Walter
Dean Myers
I never dreamt that tender blossoms would be brown
Or precious angels could come down to live in the garden of my giving heart
But here you are brown angel.
No rhyme or regular rhythm

• ALLITERATION
-Repetition of the same consonant sound at the beginning of several words or sentences or a line of poetry.
-Poets use alliteration to make their poetry musical and more interesting.
• “Surf” by Lillian
Morrison
W aves w ant to be w heels,
They jump for it and f ail f all f lat like pole vaulters and sprawl arms outstretched f oam f ingers reaching.
Same Beginning
Sounds

• IMAGERY
-Language that appeals to the 5 senses.
-Are “word pictures”.
-Helps the reader to experience familiar things in a fresh way using the senses.
• “There is a Thing” by
Jack Prelutsky
There is a thing beneath the stair with slimy face and oily hair that does not move or speak or sing or do anything single thing but sit and wait beneath the stair with slimy face and oily hair.
Strong Image
Sensory
Words
USES SENSES
Sound
Smell
Taste
Touch
Sight

• Hyperbole
-Describe something as larger or wildly different than it actually is.
-Poets use exaggeration to create a mental picture and spark a reader’s imagination.
• “Beetles” by Monica
Shannon
Beetles must use polish,
They look so new and shiny!
Just like a freshly painted car,
Except for being tiny.
Poet stretches the truth about how beetles become shiny to make readers smile and to create greater interest in these insects.

• SIMILE
-Comparison between 2 things, using the words like or as.
-Poets use comparison between things to make you thing about them in a new way.
-Used to surprise the reader and to create strong images.
• “The World” by Noel Berry
The trees are like the hair of the world.
The city is like the heart of the world.
The wind is a flute player playing in the night.
The cars beeping horns are like buttons beeping inside the earth.
Each bird is like a single piccolo singing away and the grass, just like me , being buried under the snow.
Comparisons trees to hair car horns beeping to buttons grass to a person a city to a heart bird to a piccolo

• METAPHOR
-Direct comparison between 2 things.
-Does NOT use the words like or as.
-Poet describes a thing or person as if it actually were the other thing or person.
-Creates a clear memorable picture and tries to get you to see the original subject in a new way.
• “Dreams” by Langston
Hughes
Hold fast to dreams
For if dreams die
Comparison of life to a bird
Life is a broken-winged bird
That cannot fly.
Hold fast to dreams
For when dreams go
Life is a barren field
Frozen with snow.
Comparison of life to a field

• ONOMATOPOEIA
-Use words that sound like the noises they describe.
-Poets choose words not just for what they mean, but what they sound like.
-Poets use onomatopoeia to liven up their writing and add fun sounds to it.
• “The Fourth” by Shel
Silverstein
Oh,
CRASH!
My
BASH!
It’s
BANG!
The
ZANG!
Fourth
WHOOSH!
Of
BAROOM!
July
WHEW!
On the
Fourth of July you hear:
Crashes
Bashes
Bangs
Zangs
Whooshs
Barooms
Whews

• PERSONIFICATION
-Type of figure of speech that gives human qualities to animals, objects, or ideas.
-Adds life to a poem and helps the reader view a familiar thing in a new way.
• “Snowy Benches” by
Aileen Fisher
Do parks get lonely in winter, perhaps, when benches have only snow on their laps?
Parks have feelings and benches have laps
The poet asks whether the parks feel lonely in winter, like people sometimes do.

• IDIOM
-An everyday saying that doesn’t mean what the words say.
-Poet’s use idioms because that’s the way people talk to each other.
-Example: “easy as pie” means you are able to do something without difficulty.
• “Last Night” by David L.
Harrison
Last night I knew the answers.
Last night I had them pat.
Last night I could have told you
Every answer, just like that!
Last night my brain was cooking.
Last night I got them right.
Last night I was a genius.
So where were you last night!
“I had them pat”- knowing something well.
“My brain is cooking”- it was working fast and bubbling over with ideas.

• Words that imitate the sound they are naming
BUZZ
• OR sounds that imitate another sound
“The silken, sad, uncertain, rustling of each purple curtain . . .”

• Exaggeration often used for emphasis.

• When a person, place, thing, or event that has meaning in itself also represents, or stands for, something else.
= Innocence
= America
= Peace

• “The Farmer” by Carole
Boston Weatherford
• SYMBOL
-Something that stands for something more than just itself.
-Suggests another larger meaning.
-Example: the American flag is a symbol of freedom.
A plot of weeds,
An old grey mule.
Hot sun and sweat
On a bright Southern day.
Strong, stern papa
Under a straw hat,
Plowing and planting
His whole life away.
His backbone is forged
Of African Iron
And red Georgia clay.
The farmer is a symbol of the proud American culture and the
South. “African
Iron” and “red
Georgia clay” describe the farmer, but link him to his
African ancestors in Africa and his fellow southerners.

• “Poor” by Myra
Livingston
• MOOD
-Feeling that a poem creates in the reader.
-Can be positive or negative.
-Poet creates mood with the length of sentences, the words chosen, punctuation, and the sounds of the words.
I heard of poor.
It means hungry, no food.
No shoes, no place to live,
Nothing good.
It means winter nights
And being cold
It is lonely, alone.
Feeling old.
Poor is a tired face.
Poor is thin.
Poor is standing outside
Looking in.
Short words and lines create a serious mood.
Words create a feeling of sadness.

Tone is the AUTHOR’S attitude towards the audience, the subject, or the character
You can recognize the tone/attitude by the language/word choices the author uses. His language will reveal his perspective/opinion (that is, whether it is positive/negative) about the subject .

• Adjectives are used to describe tone
• Have a healthy “tone vocabulary”
• Consider some words that describe tone.
– Sarcastic, sincere, embarrassed, proud or frightened
• The key to choosing the correct tone is to carefully consider the author’s word choice.

• TONE
-Attitude a writer takes toward the subject or audience of a poem.
• “The Crocodile”
How doth the crocodile
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the water of the Nile
On every golden scale!
How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly he spreads his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws!
The subject of the poem is crocodiles. The author’s attitude towards crocodiles is that they are dangerous.

• Language that appeals to the senses.
• Most images are visual, but they can also appeal to the senses of sound, touch, taste, or smell.
then with cracked hands that ached from labor in the weekday weather . . .
from “Those Winter Sundays”

• A form of “word play” in which words have a double meaning.
• I wondered why the baseball was getting bigger and then it hit me.
• I’m reading a book about antigravity. It’s impossible to put it down.
• I was going to look for my missing watch, but I didn’t have the time.