ENGLISH 11 POETRY DEVICES

Speaker O voice that addresses the reader; author and speaker are NOT necessarily the same O Example: Speaker = an object I am silver and exact. I have no preconceptions. What ever you see I swallow immediately Just as it is, unmisted by love or dislike ~ Sylvia Plath

Rhythm O – pattern of sound created by the arrangement of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line O Example: See Meter

Meter O a regular pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables that set the overall rhythm of certain poems O Example: iambic pentameter – U / U / U / U / “The brain is wider than the sky” (Dickenson)

Rhyme O repetition of similar sounds in words that appear close to each other in a poem

Internal rhyme O occurs within a single line of poetry O Example: “Ah, distinctly I remember, it was in the bleak December, and each separate, dying ember wrought its ghost upon my floor.”

End rhyme O occurs at the end of lines O Example:

Slant(eye) rhyme O words that nearly, but not exactly, rhyme O Example: “prove” and “glove” O Example: “farm” and “yard”

Rhyme scheme O pattern of rhyme formed by end rhyme; identified by assigning a different letter of the alphabet to each new rhyme O Example: A word is dead a When it is said a Some say b I say it just c Begins to live d That day. b

Alliteration O the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of words O Example: “Two hours later, shortly before dark, the panting puppy pack returned.” ~ Jim Kjelgaard, Irish Red

Assonance O the repetition of vowel sounds within words or at the ends of words O Example: while I try to weigh what you might say, okay?

Consonance O repetition of consonant sounds within words or at the end of words O Example: the letter sat atop her stack

Onomatopoeia O use of a word or phrase that imitates a word it describes O Example : “buzz” “splat” “hiss”

Imagery O – descriptive language that evokes an emotional response and appeals to the senses – sight, sound, touch, taste, or smell O Example: Over the winter glaciers I see the summer glow. And through the wild-piled snowdrift The warm rosebuds below. (Beyond Winter Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Simile O figure of speech that uses words such as “like” or “as” to compare seemingly unlike things O Example: The trees looked like pitch forks against the winter sky.

Metaphor O compares or equates seemingly unlike things by stating that one thing is another; does NOT use “like” or “as” O Example: “Death is a long sleep”

Personification O figure of speech in which an animal, an object, or an idea is given human characteristics O Example: “Shivering with the arms of death around him” (Hawthorne)

Stanza O a group of lines in a poem O Example: Over the winter glaciers I see the summer glow. And through the wild-piled snowdrift The warm rosebuds below. (Beyond Winter Ralph Waldo Emerson)

Couplet O 2 lines of rhyme in a poem O Example: The night was creeping on the ground! She crept, and did not make a sound ~ James Stephens, Check