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Welcome to the
World of Poetry!
Poetry
Poetry
What is poetry? Who knows?
Not a rose but the scent of a rose;
Not the sky but the light of the sky;
Not the fly but the gleam of the fly;
Not the sea but the sound of the sea;
Not myself but what makes me
See, hear, and feel something that prose
Cannot, and what it is, who knows?
Eleanor Farjeon, “Poetry”, 1968
What can poetry do for you?
Poetry expresses
moods.
Poetry helps you to
identify with people and
situations:
 Robert Louis Stevenson
 Robert Frost
 Shel Silverstein
 Langston Hughes
Poetry grants
insights into yourself
and others, developing
sensitivity to
universal needs and
feelings.
What Is Poetry?
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Poetry is not easily defined, nor is it easily measured
or classified.
There is no single definition of poetry.
Some definitions specify the characteristics of poetry,
including the poetic elements and the functions of
words.
Other definitions emphasize its emotional impact.
Elements of Poetry
Poets use everyday
language in different ways
to encourage readers:
 to see familiar things in a
new light
 to draw on their senses
 to fantasize
Poets also use certain
devices to create:
 medleys of sounds
 suggest visual
interpretations
 communicate messages
The criteria for selecting
poetry:
 rhythm
 rhyme and other sound
patterns
 repetition
 imagery
 shape in the creation of
poetry
Elements of Poetry
Rhythm
 The word rhythm is derived from the Greek rhythmos,
meaning to flow. In poetry, this flowing quality refers to
the movement of words in the poem.
 Stress, the number of syllables, and the pattern of the
syllables direct the feelings expressed in a poem.
 Many poems have a definite repetitive cadence, or
meter, with certain lines containing a certain number of
pronounced beats.
 Poets use rhythm to create dramatic effects and to
suggest moods.
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Repetition
Poets frequently use repetition to enrich or emphasize
words, phrases, lines, or even whole verses in poems.
Elements of Poetry – Sound
Devices
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Rhyme & Other Sound Patterns: Sound is an
important part of the pleasure of poetry. One of the
ways in which poets can emphasize sound is rhyming.
Rhyming may occur at the end of lines and within lines.
Alliteration – the repetition of initial consonants or
groups of consonants to create sound patterns.
Assonance – the repetition of vowel sounds to create
interesting and unusual sound patterns.
Onomatopoeia – words that imitate the actions or
sounds with which they are associated – such as plop,
jounce, beat, creak, swish, clink, hiss.
Rhyme
I heard a horseman
Ride over the hill;
The moon shone clear,
The night was still;
His helm was silver,
And pale was he;
And the horse he rode
Was of ivory.
Walter de la Mare, “The Horseman” 1923.
Assonance
(Repetition of vowel sounds)
He clasps the crag with crooked hands
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ringed with the azure world, he stands . . .
Alfred Tennyson, “The Eagle” 1851
Onomatopoeia
Edgar Allan Poe’s “The Bells”
(Stanza 1)
Hear the sledges with the bells Silver bells!
What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,
In the icy air of night!
While the stars that oversprinkle
All the heavens seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tintinnabulation that so musically wells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
Alliteration
(Repetition of consonant sounds)
Dinogar’s speckled petticoat
was made of skins and speckled stoat;
whip whip whipalong
eight times we sing the song.
Gwyn Williams, “The Rattle Bag” 1982
Elements of Poetry
Imagery
 Imagery is a primary element in poetry. It encourages
you to see, hear, feel, taste, smell, and touch the worlds
created by poets.
Figurative Language
 Poets use figurative language (language with nonliteral
meaning) to create imagery in their poetry. This helps to
clarify, add vividness, and encourage readers to
experience things in a new way.
 Metaphors, Similes, Personification, and Hyperbole are all
examples of figurative language.
Elements of Poetry:
Figurative Language
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Metaphors – implied comparisons between things that
have something in common but are essentially different.
Metaphors highlight certain qualities in things to make
readers see them in new ways.
Similes – direct comparisons between things that have
something in common but are essentially different. The
comparisons made by similes are considered direct
because the words like or as are included in the
comparisons.
Personification – allows poets to give human emotions
and characteristics to inanimate objects, abstract ideas,
and nonhuman living things.
Hyperbole – exaggeration that creates special effects.
Metaphors
The dinosaurs are not all dead.
I saw one raise its iron head
To watch me walking down the road
Beyond our house today.
Its jaws were dripping with a load
Of earth and grass that it had cropped
It must have heard me where I stopped,
Snorted white steam my way,
And stretched its long neck out to see,
And chewed, and finned quite amiably.
Charles Malam, “Steam Shovel” 1958
Allusion
Nature's first green is gold,
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.
Nothing Gold Can Stay by Robert Frost
Similes
The moon this night is like a silver sickle
Mowing a field of stars.
It has spread a golden runner
Over the rippling waves.
With its winking shimmer
This magic carpet lures me
To fly to the moon on it.
Inna Miller, “The Path on the Sea” 1972
Personification
The leaves are gone,
The world is old,
I hear a whisper from the sky –
The dark is long,
The ground’s grown cold,
I hear the snow’s white lullaby.
She breathes it softly
Through the air,
While with her gown of flakes she sweeps
The sky, the trees, the ground grown cold,
Singing hush
Now hush.
Now hush,
Hush
Sleep.
Deborah Chandra, “Snowfall” 1990.
Parallelism (Parallel Structure)
 Parallelism
is a type of repetition. A writer
presents a series of sentences or
sentence elements, all written in a similar
style or manner. Sometimes words are
repeated, but sometimes the repetition is
only a similarity.
Example of Parallel Structure
“I lingered round them, under that benign sky: watched
the moths fluttering among the heath and harebells;
listened to the soft wind breathing through the grass; and
wondered how anyone could ever imagine unquiet
slumbers for the sleepers in that quite earth.”
–Emily Bronte, Wuthering Heights
*note how the subject “I” does four things, all of similar
grammatical structures: lingered…, watched…,
listened…., wondered….
Another Example of Parallel
Structure
“In the past we have had a light which flickered, in the
present we have a light which flames, and in the future
there will be a light which shines over the land and the
sea.”
–Sir Winston Churchill
*Note how the writer addresses time in a similar, or
parallel, manner. "In the past...in the present...in the
future...." Each element begins with a parallel
prepositional phrase.
Anaphora
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Anaphora: Repetition of the same word or group of
words at the beginning of successive clauses,
sentences, or lines.
This royal throne of kings, this sceptred isle,
This earth of majesty, this seat of Mars,
This other Eden, demi-paradise,
This fortress built by Nature for herself
Against infection and the hand of war,
This happy breed of men, this little world,
This precious stone set in the silver sea,
Which serves it in the office of a wall,
Or as [a] moat defensive to a house,
Against the envy of less happier lands;
Forms of Poetry
Lyric Poetry
 A lyric poem is a poem that is brief and discontinuous,
emphasizing sound and picture imagery rather than
narrative or dramatic movement.
 The epic poems of the Greeks were narratives
emphasizing heroic deeds. Now, as in the past, lyric
poems emphasize musical, pictorial, and emotional
qualities.
Narrative Poetry
 Poets may be expert storytellers. A poem that tells a
story is narrative poetry.
 With rapid action and typically chronological order, story
poems have long been favorites of children.
Lyric Poem
Whenever the moon and stars are set,
Whenever the wind is high,
All night long in the dark and wet,
A man goes riding by.
Late in the night when the fires are out,
Why does he gallop and gallop about?
Emphasizes
sound and
picture imagery
Whenever the trees are crying aloud,
And ships are tossed at sea,
By, on the highway, low and loud,
By at the gallop goes he.
By at the gallop he goes, and then
By he comes back at the gallop again.
Robert Louis Stevenson, “Windy Nights”
Narrative Poem
Tells a story
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The artic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights
have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was the night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Ted Harrison, “The Cremation of Sam McGee,” 1986
Forms of Poetry
Ballads
 The ballad is a form of narrative folk song developed in
Europe during the Middle Ages.
 Minstrels and bards (a bard is the Welsh word for poet)
sang the tales of legend or history, while accompanying
themselves on stringed instruments.
 Modern poets have used the ballad form for poems to be
read rather than sung.
Example: “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner,” Samuel T.
Coleridge, 1798
We will read at a later time…
Forms of Poetry
Haiku
 A very old form of Japanese poetry.
 A haiku has three lines. The first line has five syllables, the
second line has seven syllables, and the final line has five.
 Haiku poetry is often associated with nature and seasons.
Over the wintry (5)
forest, winds howl in a rage (7)
with no leaves to blow. (5)
by Soseki (1275-1351)
Sonnet – Shakespearian and
Petrarchian (Italian)
 14
line poem written in iambic pentameter
(5 unaccented syllables each followed by
an accented one)
 Shakespearian Sonnet contains 3
quatrains and a rhyming couplet at the end
(rhyme scheme = ABAB CDCD EFEF GG)
 Petrarchian Sonnet contains one stanza
(rhyme scheme = ABBAABBACDCDCD)
Shakespearian Sonnet
Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day
By William Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? (A)
Thou art more lovely and more temperate. (B)
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, (A)
And summer's lease hath all too short a date. (B)
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, (C)
And often is his gold complexion dimm'd;(D)
And every fair from fair sometime declines, (C)
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;(D)
But thy eternal summer shall not fade (E)
Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st;(F)
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st in his shade, (E)
When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st (F)
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,(G)
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.(G)
Petrarchian Sonnet
How Do I Love Thee? (Sonnet 43)
by Elizabeth Barrett Browning
How do I love thee? Let me count the ways. (A)
I love thee to the depth and breadth and height (B)
My soul can reach, when feeling out of sight (B)
For the ends of being and ideal grace. (A)
I love thee to the level of every day's (A)
Most quiet need, by sun and candle-light. (B)
I love thee freely, as men strive for right. (B)
I love thee purely, as they turn from praise. (A)
I love thee with the passion put to use (C)
In my old griefs, and with my childhood's faith. (D)
I love thee with a love I seemed to lose (C)
With my lost saints, -- I love thee with the breath, (D)
Smiles, tears, of all my life; and, if God choose, (C)
I shall but love thee better after death. (D)
Ode
An Ode is a poem praising and glorifying a
person, place or thing.
On My First Son by Ben Jonson
Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy;
My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy.
Seven years thou wert lent to me, and I thee pay,
Exacted by thy fate, on the just day.
Oh, could I lose all father now! For why
Will man lament the state he should envy?
To have so soon 'scaped world's and flesh's rage,
And if no other misery, yet age!
Rest in soft peace, and asked, say, Here doth lie
Ben Jonson his best piece of poetry.
For whose sake henceforth all his vows be such
As what he loves may never like too much.
Forms of Poetry
Cinquain Poems
 A five line poem containing 22
syllables
 A 2-4-6-4-2 syllable pattern
 Usually describes something but can
tell a story
Form:
Line 1:
Line 2:
Line 3:
Line 4:
Line 5:
A single word for a title
Two words to describe the title
Three words to express action
Four words to express feeling
The title again or a word like the
title
Wrestling
Heavy muscles
Coaching,
slamming,
pinning
Try hard to win
Wrestling
A Bio-Poem
A Bio-poem tells about a person, real or fictitious, using the
following format:
Line 1: First name
Line 2: Title
Line 3: Four words that describe that person
Line 4: Lover of (three or more things or ideas)
Line 5: Who believed (one or more ideas)
Line 6: Who wanted (three things or methods)
Line 7: Who used (three things or methods)
Line 8: Who gave (three things)
Line 9: Who said (a quote)
Line 10: Last name
Where do you start?
 We
will start with a strategy called
the POETRY PYRAMID. The poetry
pyramid will help you analyze poetry,
identify the tone, themes, and
purpose. Poet’s often build a poem,
starting with the foundation. When we
analyze, we work from the top down
and poet’s work from the bottom up.
Examine the title
before reading the
poem. Consider the
various connotations of
this title. Anticipate the
meaning. Ask questions.
PARAPHRASE:
Title:
Title
Paraphrase
Literal Meaning
In one sentence, what is the
literal meaning of the poem. (take out the
figurative language to get the literal meaning)
Translate
the poem into your own
words stanza by stanza
(literal/denotation). Resist
the urge to jump to
interpretation. A failure to
understand what happens
literally, inevitably leads to an
interpretive
misunderstanding. What is it
about? Write in one to three
sentences.
Audience & Purpose
Poetic Elements
Identify, label, & annotate on your poem: figurative language,
imagery, literary elements, diction, repetition, sound devices,
details, syntax, symbols, allusions, shifts, punctuation, structure
Effect of Poetic Elements
Explain how the poetic elements you identified function and affect the
meaning of the poem. (include the tone)
Theme
Write a possible theme statement in one sentence.
What is the poem saying? What is the message?
At the end of the unit…
 You
will be able to analyze a poem on
your own and discover how the poet’s
choices in diction, detail, and syntax
convey meaning
 You will be able to identify and use
elements of poetry in your own writing
Resources
 http://americanrhetoric.com/
 http://changingminds.org/techniques/langu
age/syntax/syntax.htm
 http://changingminds.org/techniques/langu
age/syntax/phrase.htm
 http://leo.stcloudstate.edu/grammar/phras
eformulas.html