1. Literary Devices and Poetic Forms
Understanding
and
Appreciating
Poetry

2. “The question is not what you look at, but what you see
“The question is not what you look at, but what you see.” - Henry David Thoreau

3. Imagery
The use of figurative language to represent actions, objects, and ideas.
Think of the image of the river in “Carry”. The image represents how death is inescapable for anyone or anything, including a powerful predator.

4. The conch in Lord of the Flies was symbolic of civilization.
Something that represents something else by association, resemblance, or convention.
The red octagon is a symbol for stop!
The conch in Lord of the Flies was symbolic of civilization.

5. Analogy
A comparison in which an idea or a thing is compared to another thing that is quite different from it.
Her voice was cotton candy.
The classroom was a furnace.
Similes and Metaphors are TOOLS of analogies.

6. Metaphors Similes
Comparison between two things that are not alike and replaces the word with another word.
My teacher is a lamb.
You are my sunshine.
Comparison between two things that are not alike and replaces the word with another word AND uses the word “like” or “as.”
My teacher is like a lamb.
You are as bright as sunshine.

7. Extended Metaphor
A comparison between two unlike things that continues throughout a series of sentences in a paragraph or lines in a poem. Often comprised of more than one sentences and sometimes consists of a full paragraph.
In Prose: “Bobby Holloway says my imagination is a three-hundred-ring circus. Currently I was in ring two hundred and ninety-nine, with elephants dancing and clowns cart wheeling and tigers leaping through rings of fire. The time had come to step back, leave the main tent, go buy some popcorn and a Coke, bliss out, cool down.” (Dean Koontz, Seize the Night. Bantam, 1999)
In Hip-Hop: “But if you was LeBron James then I’d be Dwayne Wade We both graduated at the same time from the same grade He was at the head of the class, on TV with celebrity acts, But that champion ring was one thing you never could grasp, I was slightly rated lower had to fight to gain exposure and that might’ve made me slower but now I have taken over And I’m down in Miami’s Heat, living my boyhood dreams And for you to do what I’ve done, you’d have to join MY team!” -Iron Solomon (LeBron James to Dwayne Wade)

8. Meter
The measured arrangement of words in poetry that creates its rhythm.
“Because/ I could/ not stop/ for death/
He kind/ly stopped /for me.”
Notice how language has a distinct rhythm determined by syllables and sound.

9. Rhyme Scheme
The rhyme pattern of a poem, determined by the last word of each line.

10. Rhyme Scheme Example “Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall (a)
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall (a)
All the king’s horses and all the King’s men, (b)
Couldn’t put Humpty together again. (b)

11. Stanza
A stanza is the grouping of lines in a poem.

12. Stanza Example Because I could not stop for death—
He kindly stopped for me—
The carriage held but just ourselves—
And immortality (Stanza 1)
We slowly drove—He knew no haste
And I had put away
My labor and my leisure too,
For His Civility-- (Stanza 2)

13. Enjambment
French for “to put legs across or step over”
No punctuation mark at the end of the line
Running on of a thought from one line to another
Quickens the pacing and rhythm

14. “April is the cruelest month, breeding
“April is the cruelest month, breeding enjambed Lilacs out of the dead land, mixing enjambed Memory and desire, stirring enjambed Dull roots with spring rain. Winter kept us warm, covering enjambed Earth in forgetful snow, feeding enjambed A little life with dried tubers.”
“The Waste Land” by T.S. Eliot

15. A E I O U Assonance Think Vowels!
Matching vowel sounds in neighboring words.
A E I O U
Think Vowels!

16. Assonance Example Sundays too my father got up early
And put his clothes on in the blueback cold “oh” sound
Then with cracked hands that ached “a” and “ay” sounds
From labor in the weekday weather made
Banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him. “aynk” sound
From Robert Hayden’s “Those Winter Sundays”

17. Consonance The repetition of consonants at the end of words.
For example: blank and think
Thick and block
Pitter Patter Pitter Patter
Can you think of an example? ________ and ________

18. Alliteration
An alliteration is the repetition of the initial consonant sound in neighboring words.
Examples:
Dirty Dishes
Delicate Daisy
Sweet Surrender
Gentle Gaze

19. Refrain
A refrain is a stanza or line in a poem that repeats at different intervals during the poem.
A refrain serves a similar function as the chorus in a song.

20. Refrain cont…
Think of the line, “Nevermore” in Edgar Allen Poe’s “The Raven”

21. Repetition
When a line or phrase is repeated or used several times for poetic emphasis or to stress an idea or concept.

22. Repetition cont…
Think of Tracy Chapman’s song “Fast Car” and the line, “be someone, be someone, be someone”. She repeats this three times. The repetition helps stress the strength of her desire to rise from poverty. She uses repetition for poetic effect.

23. Is there just “one” way to write a poem?
NO!
Poetic Forms

24. Many different types of poetic forms. We will focus on six.
Narrative Verse
Lyric Verse
Limerick
Haiku
Free Verse
The Sonnet (when we read Shakespeare)

25. Narrative Verse Early poems that were usually read aloud.
They are composed in a way that tells a story.
They are often heroic

26. “Paul Revere’s Ride” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
Listen, my children, and you shall hear
Of the midnight ride of Paul Revere,
On the eighteenth of April, in Seventy-Five;
Hardly a man is now alive
Who remembers the famous day and year,
He said to his friend, “If the British march
By land or sea from the town tonight,
Hang a lantern aloft in the belfry arch…

27. Lyric Verse Expresses feelings like love, sadness, joy, and grief.
Usually shorter and easier to follow than narrative verse.
Most songs on the radio are lyric verse

28. A Red, Red Rose by Robert Burns O, my luve is like a red, red rose,
That’s newly sprung in June,
O, my luve is like the melodie,
That’s sweetly play’d in tune
Cont…

29. The Limerick Short, five lined poems, that are silly and simple.
Usually about finding humor in accidents or other unfortunate events.
Often takes an unexpected turn.

30. I’d rather have fingers than toes; I’d rather have ears than a nose; And as for my hair, I’m glad it’s still there; I’ll be awfully sad when it goes. --Gelett Burgess Structure: a,a, b,b, a

31. The Haiku Poetic form that originated from Japan.
Traditional haiku has three lines.
All together the poem is 17 syllables.
Usually describes a single image.

32. Haiku cont… “Summer Grasses All that remains Of warriors dreams.”
Syllables: 5,7,5

33. Free Verse Free from limitations of meter or rhythm
Does not rhyme with fixed forms
Do not follow regular rhyme schemes
Based on normal pauses and natural rhythmical phrases

34. Bring me all of your dreams, you dreamers, Bring me all of your heart melodies that I may wrap them in a blue cloud-cloth away from the too-rough fingers of the world. - Langston Hughes

35. A noiseless patient spider, I mark’d where on a little promontory it stood isolated, Mark’d how to explore the vacant vast surrounding, It launch’d forth filament, filament, filament, out of itself, Ever unreeling them, ever tirelessly speeding them. And you O my soul where you stand, Surrounded, detached, in measureless oceans of space,……. Till the bridge you will need be form’d, till the ductile anchor hold, Till the gossamer thread you fling catch somewhere, O my soul. - “A Noiseless Patient Spider” by Walt Whitman
Walt Whitman was the father of English free verse poetry. This poem uses a simple metaphor to mesmerize the audience while still employing some literary devices (i.e. repetition).

36. The Sonnet Made famous by William Shakespeare.
Follows careful rules about length and line.
Divided into 4 parts— Three quatrains (4 lines each) and a couplet (2 lines).
Follows specific rules on stressed and unstressed beats