Elements of Poetry Definition of Poetry Literature in

Elements of Poetry

Definition of Poetry • Literature in verse form (a controlled arrangement of lines and stanzas) • Uses language to express layers of meaning

Literary Elements • Figurative language – Language that is used imaginatively rather than literally to express ideas/feelings

Examples: • Simile: uses “like” or “as” to compare 2 essentially unlike things • Ex. /She runs like the wind.

Metaphor • Compares 2 like things describing one as if it were the other • ex. / My brother’s room is a pigpen.

Personification • A figure of speech in which human qualities are given to a non-human subject • Ex. / The feather tickled my face.

Imagery • Descriptive language that creates vivid impressions. • Uses sensory language; appeals to the 5 senses

Musical qualities • Poets often use sound devices to achieve a musical quality • They do this by the language that they use

Rhythm • Pattern created by stressed and unstressed syllables • Ordered pattern of rhythm is called meter

Rhyme • Repetition of identical sounds in the last syllables of words • Pattern of rhyme at end of lines in a poem is called rhyme scheme

Alliteration • Initial rhyme • Repetition of first consonant • Ex. /the light lemon lollipop

Assonance • Vowel rhyme • Repetition of vowel sounds in nearby words • Ex. / date and fade

Consonance • Repetition of consonants within nearby words in which the separating vowels differ • Ex. / milk and walk