accentual meter: Lines of verse organized by number of stresses rather than
by feet or number of syllables. This was the form of poetry written in Old
English (which combined stress with alliteration). For a modern example, see
Richard Wilbur, "Junk" (1961). Accentual meter is the basis of sprung
rhythm.
accentual-stress meter: Lines of verse based on the metrical foot. This is the most
common form of English poetry.
alcaics: a four-line stanza of considerable metrical complexity,
named after the ancient Greek poet Alcaeus.
alliteration: The repetition of sounds in nearby words, most often
involving the initial consonants of words (and sometimes the internal
consonants in stressed syllables).
allusion: An indirect reference to a text, myth, event, or person
outside the poem itself (compare echo). Although it is woven into the context
of the poem, it carries its own history of meaning: for example, see the
reference to Hamlet in T. S. Eliot, "The Love Song of J. Alfred
Prufrock" (1917).
ambiguity: The ability to mean more than one thing.
analogy: Resemblance in certain respects between things that are
otherwise unlike; also, the use of such likeness to predict other similarities.
anapest: Two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed one, as in
"unabridged" (see foot).
assonance: The repetition of vowel sounds in a line or series of
lines. Assonance often affects pace (by working against short and long vowel
patterns) and seems to underscore the words included in the pattern. For
example, see the beginning of Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
"Kubla Khan" (1816).
aubade: A lyric about the dawn (e.g., see John Donne, "The Sun
Rising" [1633]).
ballad: A narrative poem, impersonally related, that is (or
originally was) meant to be sung. Characterized by repetition and often by a
repeated refrain (a recurrent phrase or series of phrases), the earliest
ballads were anonymous works transmitted orally from person to person through
generations. For example, see
"Sir Patrick Spens." Modern literary ballads imitate these folk creations (e.g.,
Samuel Taylor Coleridge, "The
Rime of the Ancient Mariner" [1798]).
ballad stanza: A four-line stanza, the second and fourth lines of which
are iambic trimeter and rhyme with each other; the first and third lines, in
iambic tetrameter, do not rhyme. This form, frequently used in hymns, is also
known as "common meter"; a loose form of it is often used by Emily
Dickinson.
blank verse: Unrhymed iambic pentameter; for example, see Alfred, Lord
Tennyson,
"Ulysses" (1842).
caesura: A sign, used in scansion, that marks a natural pause in
speaking a line of poetry.
concrete poetry: An attempt to supplement (or replace) verbal meaning with
visual devices from painting and sculpture. A true concrete poem cannot be
spoken; it is viewed, not read (compare
pattern poetry).
confessional poem: A relatively new (or recently defined) kind of poetry in
which the speaker focuses on the poet´s own psychic biography. This label is
often applied to writings of Robert Lowell, Sylvia Plath, and Anne Sexton.
connotation: What is suggested by a word, apart from what it explicitly
and directly describes (compare denotation). For example, the
"cypresses" of Eavan Boland´s
"That the Science of Cartography Is Limited" (1994) connote death, because of their traditional
associations with mourning.
controlling metaphors: Metaphors that dominate or organize an entire poem. For
example, metaphors of movement structure John Donne´s
"A Valediction Forbidding Mourning" (1633).
conventions: Standard ways of saying things in verse, employed to
achieve certain expected effects. Conventions may pertain to style (e.g., the
rhyme scheme of the sonnet) or content (e.g., the figure of the shepherd in the
pastoral).
couplet: A pair of lines, almost always rhyming, that form a unit.
dactyl: A stressed syllable followed by two unstressed ones, as in
"screwdriver" (see
foot).
denotation: The direct and literal meaning of a word or phrase (as
distinct from its implication). Compare
connotation.
dramatic poetry: Poetry written in the voice of one or more characters
assumed by the poet. For example, Geoffrey Chaucer´s
Canterbury Tales are dramatic narratives.
dramatic monologue: A poem written in the voice of a character, set in a specific
situation, and spoken to someone. This form is most strongly identified with
poems of Robert Browning (e.g., "My Last Duchess" [1842]); see also
Alfred, Lord Tennyson,
"Ulysses" (1842).
echo: A reference that recalls a word, phrase, or sound in
another text. For example, "And indeed there will be time" in Eliot´s
"Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" (1917) recalls both Ecclesiastes
3.1 ("To everything there is a season, and a time to every purpose under
the heaven") and Andrew Marvell, "To His Coy Mistress" (1681;
"Had we but world enough and time"). It is less specific than an
allusion.
elegy: In classical times, any poem on any subject written in
"elegiac" meter (dactylic couplets comprising a hexameter followed by
a pentameter line), but since the Renaissance usually a formal lament for the
death of a particular person. For example, see W. H. Auden,
"In Memory of W. B. Yeats" (1940).
end stop: A line break that coincides with the end of the sentence
(vs. a run-on line; compare
enjambment).
English sonnet: Three four-line stanzas and a couplet, rhymed abab cdcd
efef gg. For example, see William Shakespeare,
Sonnet 146 (1609;
"Poor soul, the center of my sinful earth").
enjambment: The use of a line that "runs on" to the next
line, without pause, to complete its grammatical sense (compare end stop). For
example, see Gwendolyn Brooks,
"We Real Cool" (1960).
envoy: A short concluding stanza found in certain poetic forms
(e.g., the sestina) that often provides a concise summing-up of the poem.
epic: A long poem, in a continuous narrative often divided into
"books," on a great or serious subject. Traditionally, it celebrates
the achievements of mighty heroes and heroines, using elevated language and a
grand, high style (e.g., Homer´s Iliad), but later epics have been more
personal (e.g., William Wordsworth´s Prelude [1805 / 1850]) and less formal in
structure (e.g., H. D. ´s Helen in Egypt [1961]).
epigram: Originally any poem carved in stone (on tombstones,
buildings, gates, etc.), but in modern usage a very short, usually witty verse
with a quick turn at the end (e.g., much of the light verse of Ogden Nash).
feminine rhyme: Rhymes comprised of a stressed syllable followed by an
unstressed syllable (e.g., see George Gordon, Lord Byron, Don Juan 1.38 [1819]:
"He learn´d the arts of riding, fencing, gunnery, / And how to scale a
fortress- or a nunnery"). Compare
masculine rhyme.
figures of speech: Uses of a word or words that go beyond the literal meaning
to show or imply a relationship, evoking a further meaning. Such figures,
sometimes called "tropes" (i.e., rhetorical "turns"),
include
anaphora,
metaphor,
metonymy, and
irony.
foot: The basic unit, consisting of two or three syllables, into
which a line is divided in scansion. Verse is labeled according to its dominant
foot (e.g., iambic) and the number of feet per line (e.g., pentameter). Lines
of one, two, three, four, five, and six feet are respectively called monometer,
dimeter, trimeter, tetrameter, pentameter, and hexameter. See
anapest,
iamb,
dactyl,
spondee, and
trochee.
free verse: Poetry that does not follow the rules of regularized meter
and strict form. However, these open forms continue to rely on patterns of
rhythm and repetition to impose order; for example, see Whitman,
"Song of Myself" (1881).
heroic couplet: A pair of rhymed lines of iambic pentameter. For example,
see Geoffrey Chaucer,
"The Pardoner´s Tale." Perhaps the most polished instances of this form are
provided by Alexander Pope.
iamb: An unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one, as in
"above" (see
foot). Iambic is the
most common meter in English poetry.
image: A mental representation of a particular thing able to be
visualized (and often able to be apprehended by senses other than sight).
irony: A figure in which what is stated is the opposite of what is
meant or expected. For example, see Wilfred Owen´s ironic use of Horace, Odes
3.2.13, in
"Dulce Et Decorum Est" (1920).
Italian sonnet: An octave (eight lines) and a sestet (six lines); typically
rhymed abbaabba cdecde, it has many variations that still reflect the basic
division into two parts separated by a rhetorical turn of argument (e.g., see
Elizabeth Barrett Browning, Sonnets from the Portuguese [1850]).
limerick: A five-line light poem, usually in anapestic rhythm. The
first, second, and fifth lines are rhymed trimeter; lines three and four are
rhymed dimeter. The rhymes are frequently eccentric, and the subject matter is
often nonsensical or obscene.
lyric: Originally a poem meant to be sung to the accompaniment of
a lyre. Now, a lyric is the most
common verse form: any fairly short poem in the voice of a single speaker,
usually expressing personal concerns rather than describing a narrative or
dramatic situation.
masculine rhyme: Rhymes that consist of a single stressed syllable. This is
the most common form of end rhyme in English (compare
feminine rhyme).
meditation: A contemplation of some physical object as a way of
reflecting upon some larger truth, often (but not necessarily) a spiritual one.
For example, see Wallace Stevens,
"Sunday Morning" (1923).
metaphor: A figure of speech that relies on a likeness or analogy
between two things to equate them and thus suggest a relationship between them.
For example, in
"A Far Cry from Africa" (1962) Derek Walcott portrays the continent as an animal,
with a "tawny pelt" and "bloodstreams." Compare
metonymy,
simile.
meter: The formal organization of the rhythm of a line into
regular patterns; see
foot,
scansion.
metonymy: A figure that relies on a close relationship other than
similarity (compare metaphor) in substituting a word or phrase for the thing
meant. For example, the "scepter" in Tennyson´s
"Ulysses" (1842) represents the rule of Ithaca.
mnemonic devices: Forms, such as rhyme, built into poems to help reciters
remember the poems.
motif: A recurrent device, formula, or situation that deliberately
connects a poem with preexisting patterns
and conventions. For example, Edmund Spenser´s
Sonnet 75 (1595;
"One day I wrote her name upon the strand") relies on the motif of
immortality through poetry (cf. William Shakespeare, Sonnet 55 [1609]).
mythologies: Large systems of belief and tradition on which cultures
draw to explain and understand themselves. These are often political or
religious, and often become conventional over time (for example, see the use of
"Venus´ son" in Elizabeth´s
"When I Was Fair and Young").
narrative: Poetry that tells a story and is primarily characterized by
linear, chronological description.
occasional poem: A poem written about or for a specific occasion, public or
private (e.g., Maya Angelou´s
poem for the 1993 presidential inauguration, "On the Pulse of
Morning"). Such poems can transcend the particular incident that inspired
them; for example, see William Butler Yeats,
"Easter 1916" (1916).
ode: An extended lyric, usually elevated in style and with an
elaborate stanzaic structure (e.g., see Samuel Taylor Coleridge,
"Dejection: An Ode" [1817]).
off-rhyme: Rhyme that does not perfectly match in vowel or consonant
sound; for example, see William Butler Yeats, "
Easter 1916"
(1916): faces / houses, gibe / club, etc.
onomatopoeia: Use of a word or words the sound of which approximates the
sound of the thing denoted (e.g., "splash").
oxymoron: A figure of speech that combines two apparently
contradictory words (e.g, John Milton´s description of the flames of hell as
giving "No light, but rather darkness visible" in
Paradise Lost 1.63 [1667]).
parody: A poem that imitates another poem closely, but changes
details for comic or critical effect. For example, "The Dover Bitch"
by Anthony Hecht (1968) parodies Matthew Arnold´s "Dover Beach"
(1867).
pastoral: A poem (also called an eclogue, a bucolic, or an idyll)
that portrays the simple life of country folk, usually shepherds, as a timeless
world of beauty, peace, and contentment. From its beginnings (the Greek Idyls
of Theocritus, third century B.C.), pastoral has idealized rural life; poets
have used the conventions of this highly artificial form to explore subjects
having little to do with any actual countryside (for example, see Christopher
Marlowe,
"The Passionate Shepherd to His Love" [1599, 1600]). There is also a large subgenre of pastoral
elegy (e.g., see John Milton, "Lycidas" [1637]).
pattern poetry: A poem with lines in the shape of the subject of the poem.
This form was popular in English poetry in the sixteenth and seventeenth
centuries (e.g., George Herbert, "Easter Wings" [1633]) and again in
the twentieth century (notably by John Hollander and May Swenson). Compare with
concrete poetry.
persona: A voice assumed by the author of a poem. See
speaker.
personification: Treating an abstraction as if it were a person, endowing it
with humanlike qualities. For an extended example, see Emily Dickinson,
#712 (1890;
"Because I could not stop for Death").
protest poem: An attack, sometimes indirect, on institutions or social
injustices. For example, see Anna Letitia Barbauld,
"The Rights of Woman" (1825).
pyrrhic: two successive unstressed or lightly stressed syllables.
quantitative meter: Lines of verse divided into feet, which are scanned by
syllable length (actual duration of the sound) rather than stress (compare
accentual meter).
This is the form of classical Greek and Latin verse, and it is very difficult
to reproduce in English, which privileges stress.
quatrain: A four-line stanza, whether rhymed or unrhymed. This is the
most common stanza form in English poetry.
rhyme: The repetition of the same ("perfect rhyme") or
similar sounds, most often at the ends of lines. See
off-rhyme,
vowel rhyme.
rhyme royal: A seven-line iambic pentameter stanza, rhymed ababbcc. For
example, see Thomas Wyatt,
"They Flee from Me" (1557).
scansion: The analysis of a line of poetry (by "scanning")
to determine its pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables, which usually
are divided into metrical feet. See
foot.
sestina: Six six-line stanzas and a final three-line stanza in a
complex form that repeats words, not lines (as in the
villanelle) or
rhymes. The final word in each line of the first stanza becomes the final word
in other stanzas (in a set pattern: ABCDEF, FAEBDC, CFDABE, ECBFAD, DEACFB,
BDFECA); the lines in the concluding stanza, or envoy, usually end ECA and each
line contains one of the remaining three end words. Invented in the twelfth
century by the troubadours, the form has again come into use in the twentieth
century (e.g., by Marilyn Hacker); the repetitions often convey a sense of
circling around a subject.
setting: The time and place of the action in a poem..
simile: A direct, explicit comparison of one thing to another that
usually draws the connection with the words "like" or "as."
Compare
metaphor.
situation: The context of the action in a poem; that is, what is
happening when the poem begins.
Bibliography
