Poetry Poetry defined: Poetry is a major type of literature. It features imaginative and musical language carefully chosen and arranged to communicate experiences, thoughts, or emotions.

Characteristics: Poetry differs from prose in that it compresses meaning into fewer words and often uses meter, rhyme, and imagery. Poetry is usually arranged in lines and stanzas as opposed to sentences and paragraphs and it can be more free in the ordering of words and use of punctuation.

Meter Meter is a regular rhythmic pattern in poetry. This pattern is determined by the number of beats, or stresses, in each line. Stressed and unstressed syllables are divided into rhythmical units called feet.

Types of Feet: Iambic – an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable (Example: insist) Trochaic—a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable (Example: freedom) Anapestic—two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable (unimpressed)

Types of Feet continued Dactylic—one stressed syllable followed by two unstressed syllables Spondaic--two stressed syllables

Terms used to describe the number of feet in a line: Monometer—one foot line Dimeter—two-foot line Trimeter—three-foot line Tetrameter—four –foot line

…continued Pentameter—five-foot line Hexameter—six-foot line Heptameter—seven-foot line Octameter-eight-foot line Note: The most common meters are iambic tetrameter and iambic pentameter.

Types of Rhyme: End rhyme—use of rhyming words at the ends of lines Internal rhyme—the use of rhyming words within lines Exact rhyme--rhyming words end with the same sound as in moon and June

…continued Slant rhyme—rhyming sounds are similar but not identical as in “rave” and “rove” Sight rhyme—words are spelled similarly but pronounced differently, as in “lost” and “ghost” or “give” and “thrive”

Types of poetry: Lyric (ode, sonnet) Narrative (dramatic) Epic

Lyric a highly musical type of poetry that expresses the emotions of a speaker. Lyric poems are often contrasted with narrative poems, which have storytelling as their main purpose.

Narrative Tells a story

Ode a poem to honor or praise someone or something.

Dramatic relies heavily on literary devices such as monologue or dialogue. Often dramatic poems tell stories. (Includes dramatic monologue and soliloquy.)

Sonnet a fourteen-line poem, usually in iambic pentameter, that follows a very specific rhyme scheme.

Epic a long story, often told in verse, involving heroes and gods. Grand in length and scope, and epic provides a portrait of an entire culture of the legends, beliefs, values , laws, arts, and ways of life of a people.

New Literary Terms Enjambment – Antithesis—