WHY POETRY?
Poetry is a great way to
present our feelings and ideas
to others.
This is Me …
On the roller coaster
Up and down
My soul wrenched past my teeth
A frowning clown
In the mirey swamp
Earth held, with mud clinging.
Or flying through boisterous clouds
My heart singing.
What am I trying to say?
How will you feel for me?
If you ever take away
The words of my poetry.
Anna K.
Why poetry?
• Why is it that humans have been
composing poetry since humans started to
use language?
Find out
about others
Express
feelings
Find out
about ourselves
POETRY
LETS US
Create mental
pictures
Cope with
problems
Have fun
with words
Rhyme
Visual images
FEATURES
OF POETRY
Sound images
Rhythm
RHYTHM
RHYTHM
• Rhythm helps a poet express feelings.
• A fast rhythm is often a way of expressing
happiness or excitement,
• while slow rhythms often express sorrow
or mournfulness.
• Stop-start rhythms – ones where the
rhythm stutters – can express anger or
drama, while smooth rhythms often tell us
that things are alright.
• Rhythm gives beat and flow and feeling to
poetry.
Listen to how rhythm gives life to this
Australian classic, the opening of which tells
the exciting story of a very valuable horse
that had disappeared from the cattle
property. Men are running around, getting
ready to go looking for the horse – a colt
from Old Regret, a famous racehorse.
THE MAN FROM SNOWY RIVER
‘Word’ means ‘news’ in this line.
There was movement at the station for word had got around
that the colt from Old Regret had got away.
He had joined the wild bush horses, he was worth a thousand pound,
and all the cracks had gathered for the fray…
Banjo Patterson
‘Cracks’ are top riders
The rhythm is fast – like a galloping
horse. There is a sense of urgency.
In Tennyson’s famous poem ‘Break,
Break, Break’, the rhythm is much
slower. It stops and starts. It is both
sad and dramatic. Tennyson wrote this
great poem on the death of a great
friend.
BREAK, BREAK, BREAK
Break, break, break,
On thy cold grey stones, O Sea!
And I would that my tongue could utter
The thoughts that arise in me…
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
ANSWER IN YOUR LITERACY
BOOK
1. Use two or three words to describe:
a) The feelings aroused by the rhythm of ‘The
Man from Snowy River’.
b) The feelings aroused by the rhythm of ‘Break,
Break, Break’.
2. How does the rhythm of each poem help to give
you these feelings?
Have a
go!
3. Write the opening lines of two of your own
poems with completely different rhythms.
Poems with rhythm
• http://www.angelfire.com/ct2/evenski/poetry/rhyt
hm.html
• http://www.theotherpages.org/poems/SubjIdx/rhy
me.html
• Magnetic poems
• http://www.magneticpoetry.com/magnet/index.ht
ml
• Poetry Activities
http://adifferentplace.org/poetry.htm
• Poetry links http://42explore.com/poetry.htm
RHYME
There are times
When poets use rhymes.
There are times
When they do not.
Rhyme is the repetition of a similar sounding
words at the end of lines. In the poem above,
the first three lines rhyme with each other.
The Grebs
When at night in bed I sleep
I hear the Grebs around me creep,