AMERICAN POETSBIOGRAPHICAL
BLURBS:
ALL BIOGRAPHICAL INFORMATION
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DISCOVERING COLLECTION.
Maya Angelou
Angelou has been praised for the
rich and insightful prose of her
narratives and for offering what
many observers feel is an
indispensable record of black
experience. Author James Baldwin
wrote on the publication of I Know
Why the Caged Bird Sings: "This
testimony from a Black sister marks
the beginning of a new era in the
minds and hearts and lives of all
Black men and women."
1928-
"The Lesson“ - by Maya Angelou
I keep on dying again.
Veins collapse, opening like the
Small fists of sleeping
Children.
Memory of old tombs,
Rotting flesh and worms do
Not convince me against
The challenge. The years
And cold defeat live deep in
Lines along my face.
They dull my eyes, yet
I keep on dying,
Because I love to live.
W. H. Auden
Auden’s poetry centers on moral
issues and evidences strong political,
social, and psychological
orientations. In his work, Auden
applied conceptual and scientific
knowledge to traditional verse forms
and metrical patterns while
assimilating the industrial countryside
of his youth. Poet, playwright, and
essayist W. H. Auden created in his
works an allegorical landscape rife
with machinery, abandoned mines,
and technological references.
1907-1973
“Epitaph on a Tyrant” by W. H. Auden
Perfection, of a kind, was what he was after,
And the poetry he invented was easy to
understand;
He knew human folly like the back of his hand,
And was greatly interested in armies and fleets;
When he laughed, respectable senators burst
with laughter,
And when he cried the little children died in the
streets.
Elizabeth Bishop
Bishop's reputation as an
accomplished poet rests on a
small but significant body of
highly crafted poems that
have been praised for their
precise observations and
understated, descriptive
quality. With subtle wit and
close attention to detail,
Bishop explores such themes
as isolation, personal loss,
and dislocation.
1911-1979
Excerpt from “The Fish”- by Elizabeth Bishop
I caught a tremendous fish
and held him beside the boat
half out of water, with my
hook
fast in the corner of his
mouth.
He didn’t fight.
He hadn’t fought at all.
He hung a grunting weight,
battered and venerable
and homely. Here and there
His brown skin hung in strips
like ancient wallpaper:
shapes like full-blown roses
strained and lost through age.
He was speckled with
barnacles,
fine rosettes of lime,
and infested
with tiny white sea-lice,
and underneath two or three
rags of green weed hung
down.
Anne Bradstreet c. 1612-1672
Anne Bradstreet ranks as the first true
American poet. Bradstreet was praised
in her own time for the formal, courtly
aspect of her poetry. What was most
noteworthy to her contemporaries,
however, was that this sophisticated
poetry was produced in the wilds of
America by a woman. Considered but a
relic of America's earliest literature, her
poetry was seen as a slight exception to
what the nineteenth-century reader
perceived as the artless, repressive
nature of Puritanism.
“Upon Some Distemper of Body” by Anne Bradstreet
In anguish of my heart replete with woes,
And wasting pains, which best my body knows,
In tossing slumbers on my wakeful bed,
Bedrenched with tears that flowed from mournful
head,
Till nature had exhausted all her store,
Then eyes lay dry, disabled to weep more;
And looking up unto his throne on high,
Who sendeth help to those in misery;
He chased away those clouds and let me see
My anchor cast i' th' vale with safety.
He eased my soul of woe, my flesh of pain,
and brought me to the shore from troubled main.
Gwendolyn Brooks
Gwendolyn Brooks was the
first African American to win a
Pulitzer Prize, in 1950. Brooks
has been associated with the
Black Arts movement of the
late 1960s. Long a trailblazer,
in 1985 she became the first
African American woman to be
appointed poetry consultant by
the Library of Congress.
1917-2000
“The Sonnet-ballad” by Gwendolyn Brooks
Oh mother, mother, where is happiness?
They took my lover's tallness off to war,
Left me lamenting. Now I cannot guess
What I can use an empty heart-cup for.
He won't be coming back here any more.
Some day the war will end, but, oh, I knew
When he went walking grandly out that door
That my sweet love would have to be untrue.
Would have to be untrue. Would have to court
Coquettish death, whose impudent and strange
Possessive arms and beauty (of a sort)
Can make a hard man hesitate--and change.
And he will be the one to stammer, "Yes."
Oh mother, mother, where is happiness?
William Cullen Bryant 1794-1878
Bryant's chief stylistic hallmark is
his treatment of nature,
especially his belief that it
consoles as well as provides
lessons about history and divine
purpose. His poetry embodies an
acceptance of the cycles of
change in nature and in life and
a belief that change is
providential because it leads to
an individual's spiritual progress
and moral improvement.
“Sonnet--to an American Painter Departing for Europe”
by William Cullen Bryant
Thine eyes shall see the light of distant skies:
Yet, Cole! thy heart shall bear to Europe's strand
A living image of thy native land,
Such as on thy own glorious canvass lies.
Lone lakes--savannahs where the bison roves-Rocks rich with summer garlands--solemn streams-Skies, where the desert eagle wheels and screams-Spring bloom and autumn blaze of boundless groves.
Fair scenes shall greet thee where thou goest--fair,
But different--every where the trace of men,
Paths, homes, graves, ruins, from the lowest glen
To where life shrinks from the fierce Alpine air.
Gaze on them, till the tears shall dim thy sight,
But keep that earlier, wilder image bright.
Countee Cullen
Countee Cullen emerged in the
1920s as the most famous black
writer in America. Inspired by
European sonnet form, works of
classical antiquity, and Biblical
imagery, Cullen sought to create
poetry that transcended the
boundaries of race. "If I am going
to be a poet at all," stated Cullen
in the Brooklyn Daily Eagle in
1924, "I am going to be Poet and
not Negro Poet.“
1903-1946
“For a Poet” - by Countee Cullen
I have wrapped my dreams in a silken cloth,
And laid them away in a box of gold;
Where long will cling the lips of the moth,
I have wrapped my dreams in a silken cloth;
I hide no hate; I am not even wroth
Who found earth's breath so keen and cold;
I have wrapped my dreams in a silken cloth,
And laid them away in a box of gold.
e. e. cummings
cummings's work celebrates the
individual, as well as erotic and
familial love. Conformity, mass
psychology, and snobbery were
frequent targets of his humorous
and sometimes scathing satires.
All of cummings's poetry attests to
the author's neverending search
for fresh metaphors and new
means of expression through
creative placement of words on
the page, new word constructions,
and unusual punctuation and
capitalization.
1894-1962
[i carry your heart with me(i carry it in]
By E. E. Cummings 1894–1962
i carry your heart with me(i carry it in
my heart)i am never without it(anywhere
i go you go,my dear;and whatever is done
by only me is your doing,my darling)
i fear
no fate(for you are my fate,my sweet)i want
no world(for beautiful you are my world,my true)
and it’s you are whatever a moon has always meant
and whatever a sun will always sing is you
here is the deepest secret nobody knows
(here is the root of the root and the bud of the bud
and the sky of the sky of a tree called life;which grows
higher than soul can hope or mind can hide)
and this is the wonder that's keeping the stars apart
i carry your heart(i carry it in my heart)
Rita Dove 1952Dove's poetry is characterized
by a tight control of words and
structure, an innovative use of
color imagery, and a tone that
combines objectivity and
personal concern. Although
many of her poems incorporate
black history and directly
address racial themes, they
present issues, such as
prejudice and oppression, that
transcend racial boundaries.
“This Life”- by Rita Dove
The green lamp flares on the table.
You tell me the same thing
as that one,
asleep,
upstairs.
Now I see: the possibilities
are like golden dresses in a nutshell.
As a child, I fell in love
with a Japanese woodcut
of a girl gazing at the moon.
I waited with her for her lover.
He came in white breeches and sandals.
He had a goatee—he had
your face, though I didn't know it.
Our lives will be the same—
your lips, swollen from whistling
at danger,
and I a stranger
in this desert,
nursing the tough skin of figs.
Paul Laurence Dunbar 1872-1906
Best known for his poems in dialect,
Dunbar became a sought-after writer
at the turn of the century, popular
with black and white audiences alike.
His poems and stories picture the
hopeful, sensuous, and joyous side
of working-class black life as well as
its sorrows and disillusionments. He
lifted the black oral tradition to the
height of art and looked at his people
objectively and with pride.
“Choice” – by Paul Laurence Dunbar
THEY please me not--these solemn songs
That hint of sermons covered up.
'T is true the world should heed its wrongs,
But in a poem let me sup,
Not simples brewed to cure or ease
Humanity's confessed disease,
But the spirit-wine of a singing line,
Or a dew-drop in a honey cup!
T. S. Eliot
Eliot’s poetry and prose are
frequently cited as having
helped inaugurate the modern
period in English and
American letters. Eliot is best
known for his distinctly erudite
and innovative verse. Many of
his poems combine classical
references and concerns with
elements drawn from
contemporary culture.
1888-1965
Ralph Waldo Emerson
Emerson sought to "create all
things new" with a philosophy
stressing the recognition of
ongoing creation and
revelation by a god apparent in
all things and who exists within
everyone. Traditional values of
right and wrong, good and evil,
appear in his work as
necessary opposites.
Emerson's works also
emphasize individualism.
18031882
“Morning at the Window” – by T. S. Eliot
They are rattling breakfast plates in basement
kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.
The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.
“Eros” – by Ralph Waldo Emerson
The sense of the world is short,
Long and various the report,—
To love and be beloved;
Men and gods have not outlearned it,
And how oft soe'er they've turned it,
'Tis not to be improved.
Allen Ginsberg
The American poet Allen
Ginsberg (1926-1997) was
one of the most celebrated
figures in contemporary
American literature. He was
a leading member of the
"Beat Movement" and
helped lead the revolt
against "academic poetry"
and the cultural and political
establishment of the mid20th century.
1926-1997
Excerpt from “Kaddish, Part I” –by
Allen Ginsberg
Strange now to think of you, gone without corsets
& eyes, while I walk on the sunny pavement of
Greenwich Village.
downtown Manhattan, clear winter noon, and I've
been up all night, talking, talking, reading the
Kaddish aloud, listening to Ray Charles blues
shout blind on the phonograph
the rhythm the rhythm--and your memory in my
head three years after-- And read Adonais' last
triumphant stanzas aloud--wept, realizing how
we suffer--
Nikki Giovanni 1943In much of her work, Giovanni
focuses on the individual's
search for love and acceptance,
reflecting what she considers a
general struggle in the AfricanAmerican community.
Concentrating on themes of
family, blackness, womanhood,
and sexuality, Giovanni's poetry
is conversational and strongly
influenced by contemporary
rhythm and blues music.
“Knoxville, Tennessee” - by Nikki Giovanni
I always like summer best
you can eat fresh corn from daddy's garden
and okra
and greens
and cabbage
and lots of barbecue
and buttermilk
and homemade ice-cream at the church picnic
and listen to
gospel music
outside at the church homecoming
and go to the mountains with your grandmother
and go barefooted
and be warm all the time
not only when you go to bed
and sleep
Oliver Wendell Holmes
1809-1894
According to one of his students,
when Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes
entered his classroom at Harvard
College to lecture on anatomy, he
was greeted "by a mighty shout
and stamp of applause”. Holmes's
fame, however, went far beyond
his medical lectures, for he also
gained renown as a poet, novelist,
biographer, and essayist.
Furthermore, his writings exhibited
an independent intellectual
attitude, aversion to any restraint
on free thought, and a scientific
habit of mind.
Excerpt from “The Old Man Dreams” - by Oliver Wendell
Holmes
OH for one hour of youthful joy!
Give back my twentieth spring!
I'd rather laugh, a bright-haired boy,
Than reign, a gray-beard king.
Off with the spoils of wrinkled age!
Away with Learning's crown!
Tear out life's Wisdom-written page,
And dash its trophies down!
One moment let my life-blood stream
From boyhood's fount of flame!
Give me one giddy, reeling dream
Of life all love and fame!
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
1807-1882
He is credited with having been
instrumental in introducing
European culture to the
American readers of his day. In
addition, he simultaneously
popularized American folk
themes abroad, where his works
enjoyed an immense readership.
He is known for his narrative
style of writing and his (and
America's) most famous poems,
"Paul Revere's Ride."
“Autumn”- by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Thou comest, Autumn, heralded by the rain,
With banners, by great gales incessant fanned,
Brighter than brightest silks of Samarcand,
And stately oxen harnessed to thy wain!
Thou standest, like imperial Charlemagne,
Upon thy bridge of gold;
thy royal hand
Outstretched with benedictions o'er the land,
Blessing the farms through all thy vast domain!
Thy shield is the red harvest moon, suspended
So long beneath the heaven's o'er-hanging eaves;
Thy steps are by the farmer's prayers attended;
Like flames upon an altar shine the sheaves;
And, following thee, in thy ovation splendid,
Thine almoner, the wind, scatters the golden leaves!
Edna St. Vincent Millay
Millay’s verse captured the
rebellious mood of post-World War I
youth. She is primarily remembered
for her early volumes of poetry,
which boldly asserted an
independent, nonconformist
perspective toward contemporary
life rarely expressed by women
authors of her time. An advocate of
individualism and romanticism in
her verse, Millay commonly
employed rhyme and traditional
metrical patterns to convey her
nontraditional ideas about the role
of women in relationships and
society.
18921950
“What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why
(Sonnet XLIII)” - by Edna St. Vincent Millay
What lips my lips have kissed, and where, and why,
I have forgotten, and what arms have lain
Under my head till morning; but the rain
Is full of ghosts tonight, that tap and sigh
Upon the glass and listen for reply,
And in my heart there stirs a quiet pain
For unremembered lads that not again
Will turn to me at midnight with a cry.
Thus in winter stands the lonely tree,
Nor knows what birds have vanished one by one,
Yet knows its boughs more silent than before:
I cannot say what loves have come and gone,
I only know that summer sang in me
A little while, that in me sings no more.
Marianne Moore 1887- 1972
Moore created poetry characterized
by loose rhythms, carefully chosen
words, close attention to descriptive
detail, and acute observation of
human character. Moore's poems
often reflect her preoccupation with
the relationships between the
common and the uncommon,
advocate discipline in both art and
life, and espouse virtues of restraint,
modesty, and humor. She frequently
used animals as a central image to
emphasize themes of independence,
honesty, and the integration of art
and nature.
“He Made This Screen” – by Marianne Moore
not of silver nor of coral,
but of weatherbeaten laurel.
Here, he introduced a sea
uniform like tapestry;
here, a fig-tree; there, a face;
there, a dragon circling space -designating here, a bower;
there, a pointed passion-flower.
Sylvia Plath
Plath became widely known following
her suicide in 1963 and the
posthumous publication of Ariel
(1965), a collection containing her
most startling and acclaimed verse.
Through bold metaphors and stark,
often violent and unsettling imagery,
Plath's works evoke some of the
mythic qualities of nature and human
experience. Her vivid, intense poems
explore such topics as personal
identity, individual suffering and
oppression, and the inevitability of
death.
1932-1963
“A Better Resurrection” – by Sylvia Plath
I have no wit, I have no words, no tears;
My heart within me like a stone
Is numbed too much for hopes or fears;
Look right, look left, I dwell alone;
A lift mine eyes, but dimmed with grief
No everlasting hills I see;
My life is like the falling leaf;
O Jesus, quicken me.
Edgar Allan Poe
It is Poe's achievement in the short
story for which he is best remembered
by critics. Yet Poe retains a popular
audience rare among so-called
"classic" authors, for his tales of terror
contain a fascination and a mystery
that appeals to many readers.
Whether they are published as comic
books, released as movies, or read in
their original versions, Poe's dark
tales speak to the human desire to
peer into the realm of the unknown
and the unspeakable.
1809-1849
“Sonnet: To Science” – by Edgar Allan Poe
Science! true daughter of Old Time thou art!
Who alterest all things with thy peering eyes.
Why preyest thou thus upon the poet's heart,
Vulture, whose wings are dull realities?
How should he love thee? or how deem thee wise?
Who wouldst not leave him in his wandering
To seek for treasure in the jewelled skies,
Albeit he soared with an undaunted wing?
Hast thou not dragged Diana from her car?
And driven the Hamadryad from the wood
To seek a shelter in some happier star?
Hast thou not torn the Naiad from her flood,
The Elfin from the green grass, and from me
The summer dream beneath the tamarind tree?
Ezra Pound
Pound sought to employ le mot
juste--the precise word--which
often took the form of foreign
phrases, archaic dialects, or
technical diction, and he revived
the end-stopped line to create
self-contained measures of
poetry that resonate with
independent significance. In
addition, Pound's experiments
with rhythm are often considered
the first substantial twentiethcentury efforts to liberate poetry
from iambic patterns.
1885-1972
“A Girl” - by Ezra Pound
The tree has entered my hands,
The sap has ascended my arms,
The tree has grown in my breastDownward,
The branches grow out of me, like arms.
Tree you are,
Moss you are,
You are violets with wind above them.
A child - so high - you are,
And all this is folly to the world.
Adrienne Rich
Rich is praised for lyrical and
highly crafted poems in which she
explores a variety of socially
relevant subjects, including
feminism, and criticizes patriarchal
societies where women
traditionally assume secondary
status to men. An early proponent
of societal changes that reflect the
values and goals of women, Rich
is credited with articulating one of
the most profound poetic
statements of the modern feminist
movement.
1929-
“For the Dead” – by Adrienne Rich
I dreamed I called you on the telephone
to say: Be kinder to yourself
but you were sick and would not answer
The waste of my love goes on this way
trying to save you from yourself
I have always wondered about the left-over
energy, the way water goes rushing down a hill
long after the rains have stopped
or the fire you want to go to bed from
but cannot leave, burning-down but not burnt-down
the red coals more extreme, more curious
in their flashing and dying
than you wish they were
sitting long after midnight
Theodore Roethke 1908-1963
American poet and teacher
Theodore Roethke (1908-1963)
is considered a major poet of his
generation. He demonstrated a
wide range of styles and
growing awareness of how to
transform his love of nature into
a vehicle for expressing his
mystical visions. His work
conveys through dynamic,
descriptive imagery the physical
essence of nature and the
human body.
“Wish for a Young Wife”- by Theodore Roethke
My lizard, my lively writher,
May your limbs never wither,
May the eyes in your face
Survive the green ice
Of envy’s mean gaze;
May you live out your life
Without hate, without grief,
And your hair ever blaze,
In the sun, in the sun,
When I am undone,
When I am no one.
Carl August Sandburg 1878-1967
Carl Sandburg developed a unique
and controversial form of free verse
that captured the rhythms and color
of Midwestern American vernacular.
While some critics have dismissed
Sandburg for his sentimental
depictions of urban and agrarian
landscapes and for his simple style,
others have lauded his rhapsodic
and lyrical technique and his
effective patterns of parallelism and
repetition.
“LOST” – by Carl Sandburg
DESOLATE and lone
All night long on the lake
Where fog trails and mist creeps,
The whistle of a boat
Calls and cries unendingly,
Like some lost child
In tears and trouble
Hunting the harbor's breast
And the harbor's eyes.
Anne Sexton
Sexton was among the bestknown of the often controversial
Confessional poets, a group
composed primarily of New
England writers who rose to
prominence during the 1950s and
early 1960s. She wrote highly
introspective verse that revealed
intimate details of her emotional
troubles, including the severe
depression from which she
suffered for most of her adult life
and which led to her suicide.
1928-1974
“Housewives” – by Anne Sexton
Some women marry houses.
It's another kind of skin;
it has a heart, a mouth, a liver and bowel
movements.
The walls are permanent and pink.
See how she sits on her knees all day, faithfully
washing herself down.
Men enter by force, drawn back like Jonah into
their fleshy mothers.
A woman is her mother.
That's the main thing.
Gary Soto
Soto is one of America's
most honored writers of
Chicano poetry. Soto writes
only in English, choosing
words that are Spartan,
images that are harsh, and
subject matter that is often
autobiographical—
characteristics which
effectively help to present
his major theme, the plight
of the Chicano.
1952-
“Looking Around, Believing”- by Gary Soto
How strange that we can begin at any time.
With two feet we get down the street.
With a hand we undo the rose.
With an eye we lift up the peach tree
And hold it up to the wind — white blossoms
At our feet. Like today. I started
In the yard with my daughter,
With my wife poking at a potted geranium,
And now I am walking down the street,
Amazed that the sun is only so high,
Just over the roof, and a child
Is singing through a rolled newspaper
And a terrier is leaping like a flea
And at the bakery I pass, a palm,
Like a suctioning starfish, is pressed
To the window. We're keeping busy —
This way, that way, we're making shadows
Where sunlight was, making words
Where there was only noise in the trees.
Gertrude Stein
A controversial figure
during her lifetime, Stein
is now regarded as a
major literary Modernist
and one of the most
influential writers of the
twentieth century.
Working against the
naturalistic conventions of
nineteenth-century fiction,
she developed an
abstract manner of
expression.
1874-1946
“Tender Buttons (Apple)” – by
Gertrude Stein
APPLE
Apple plum, carpet steak, seed clam, colored wine,
calm seen, cold cream, best shake, potato,
potato and no no gold work with pet, a green
seen is called bake and change sweet is bready,
a little piece a little piece please.
A little piece please. Cane again to the
presupposed and ready eucalyptus tree, count
out sherry and ripe plates and little corners of a
kind of ham. This is use.
Henry David Thoreau 1817-1862
Thoreau advocates a simple,
self-sufficient way of life in
order to free the individual from
self-imposed social and
financial obligations. He also
pleads for a more intimate
relationship between human
beings and nature as an
antidote to the deadening
influence of an increasingly
industrialized society.
“Epitaph on the World” – by Henry David
Thoreau
Here lies the body of this world,
Whose soul alas to hell is hurled.
This golden youth long since was past,
Its silver manhood went as fast,
An iron age drew on at last;
'Tis vain its character to tell,
The several fates which it befell,
What year it died, when 'twill arise,
We only know that here it lies.
Alice Walker
Alice Walker writes about the black
woman's struggle for spiritual
wholeness and sexual, political,
and racial equality. Although most
critics categorize her writings as
feminist, Walker rebuffs the label,
describing her work and herself as
"womanist." Walker's central
characters are almost always black
women; the themes of sexism and
racism are predominant in her
work, but her impact is felt across
both racial and sexual boundaries.
1944-
“The Old Men Used to Sing” – by Alice Walker
The old men used to sing
And lifted a brother
Carefully
Out the door
I used to think they
Were born
Knowing how to
Gently swing
A casket
They shuffled softly
Eyes dry
More awkward
With the flowers
Than with the widow
After they'd put the
Body in
And stood around waiting
In their
Brown suits.
Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman spent three years
during the Civil War tending
wounded Union and Confederate
soldiers. His poems, speeches,
letters, and newspaper articles from
that time recount the horrors of war
and the struggles of a nation
divided. Whitman's vision of
humanity was radically egalitarian,
democratic ideals and unveiled an
ambitious poetic persona designed
to serve as the embodiment of
America. The poems of Leaves of
Grass glorify America through
evocations of its citizenry,
landscape, and history.
1819-1892
“O Living Always- Always Dying” – by Walt
Whitman
O LIVING always—always dying!
O the burials of me, past and present!
O me, while I stride ahead, material, visible,
imperious as ever!
O me, what I was for years, now dead, (I lament
not—I am content;)
O to disengage myself from those corpses of me,
which I turn and look at, where I cast them!
To pass on, (O living! always living!) and leave the
corpses behind!
William Carlos Williams
1883-1963
Often praised for its vivid imagery,
Williams's poetry focuses on
objects rather than directly
expressing sentiments or ideas.
Williams was a leading force in
Objectivism, which expanded upon
the Imagist concern with sight and
sound by also emphasizing thought
and feeling. Many of Williams's
poems celebrate life and are
centered on the desirability of
growth and change.
This Is Just To Say
by William Carlos Williams
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
POETRY TERMS
An Exciting Language
OXYMORON: joining contradictory terms to
make a point or emphasize a phrase... (the
cold sun, the kind killer, the small giant...)
example: excerpt from "He Stands Upon His
Tower Gazing"
Together they are apart,
apart together; opposed in flesh,
combined in spirit.
Apart is dependence but no freedom:
together fleshly- one,
but feeling
separate.
- Richard C. Guches
STANZA:
a grouping of lines in a
poem (like paragraphs
in an essay)
REFRAIN:
repetition of a group of
lines, similar to the
chorus of a song
RHYME:
repetition of end
sounds of words at the
same places (usually
end of each line)
RHYME SCHEME:
the patterns of rhyme
in a stanza (usually
mapped out using A,B,C
etc.)
example: To Electra
A I dare not ask a kiss,
B I dare not beg a smile,
A Lest having that, or this,
B I might grow proud the while.
A
B
A
B
No, no, the utmost share
Of my desire shall be
Only to kiss the air
That lately kissed thee.
- Robert Herrick
IMAGERY:
1. sensory impressions and
2. figurative language
1. Sensory impressions:
writing which appeals
to the senses (sight,
taste, sound, touch,
smell)
examples: salty,
smooth, rotten, jingle
2. Figurative language:
similes (like or as),
metaphors (is, are, am), and
personification (human
characteristics to inanimate
objects or animals) to
communicate a more symbolic
meaning, rather than literal.
Example:
Moons
There are moons like continents
Diminishing to a white stone
Softly smoking
In a fog-bound ocean.
Equinoctial moons,
Immense rain barrels spilling
their yellow water.
Moons like eyes turned inward,
Hard and bulging
On the blue cheek of eternity.
And moons half-broken,
Eaten by eagle shadows...
But the moon of the poet
Is soiled and scratched, its seas
Are flowing with dust.
And other moons are rising,
Swollen like boilsIn their blood shot depths
The warfare of planets
Silently drips and festers.
- John Highness
ASSONANCE:
(or near rhyme) where
stressed vowels in
words agree but the
consonants do not
Example:
Excerpt from 258
When it comes, the
Landscape listens
Shadows-hold their breathWhen it goes, ‘tis like the
Distance
On the look of death-Emily Dickinson
ALLITERATION:
(Or head rhyme) the
echo of the first sound
of several words in a
line
Example: The supercilious snake
suddenly and softly hissed his
message.
FREE VERSE:
Poetry that doesn’t
rhyme and doesn’t have
a constant syllable
count or line.
BLANK VERSE:
Poetry that doesn’t
rhyme but follows
syllable or stressed
patterns.
From Romeo and Juiet
“but soft! What light through
yonder window breaks
It is the east and Juliet is the
sun!
Arise, fair sin, and kill the
envious moon
Who is already sick and pale
with grief
That thou her maid art far more
fair than she.”
ONOMATOPEIA:
Words which represent
sounds (buzz, moo,
meow, swish, whirr,
hiss)
HYPERBOLE:
When conscious
exaggeration is used,
not taken literally but
for emotional effect
UNDERSTATEMENT:
When the literal sense
of what is said falls
short of the magnitude
of what is being talked
about; also used for
effect
PERSONA:
The “second self” of the
poet; when a poet creates
a character of
his/herself who is writing
the poem (narrator or
speaker who is separate
from the poet)
Mother to Son by Langston Hughes
Well, son, I'll tell you:
Life for me ain't been no crystal stair.
It's had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floorBare.
But all the time
I'se been a-climbin' on,
And reachin' landin's
And turnin' corners.
And sometimes goin' in the dark
Where there ain't been no light.
So boy, don't you turn back.
Don't you set down on those steps
'Cause you find it's kinder hard.
Don't you fall nowFor I'se still goin', honey,
I'se still climbin',
And life for me ain't been no crystal stair.