Poetry

1. Poetry Yippee!

2. What is it? • Poetry is one of the three major types of literature; the others are prose and drama. Most poems make use of highly concise, musical, and emotionally charged language. Many also make use of imagery, figurative language, and special devices of sound such as rhyme. Poems are often divided into lines and stanzas and usually employ regular rhythmical patterns, or meters.

3. Some Key Terms • Stanza –a formal division of lines in a poem. They are considered a unit and are often separated by spaces. • Meter – is the rhythmical pattern in a line of poetry and is determined by the number and types of stresses/beats per line • Atmosphere – is the mood or feeling created in a reader by a passage • Verse - A single metrical line in a poetic composition; one line of poetry/A division of a metrical composition, such as a stanza of a poem or hymn/A poem

4. Musical/Sound Devices • Alliteration – the repetition of initial consonant sounds • Consonance – repetition of similar consonant sounds • Assonance – repetition of vowel sounds • Onomatopoeia – use of words that imitate sounds

5. Musical/Sound Devices • Repetition – the use of any element of language (a sound, word, phrase, clause, sentence) more than once • Rhyme – the repetition of sounds at the ends of words • Rhythm – the pattern of beats, or stresses in language

6. Figurative Language • Personification – when a nonhuman subject is given human characteristics • Hyperbole – a deliberate exaggeration or overstatement • Understatement – form of speech in which a lesser expression is used than what is expected • Pun – a play on words

7. Figurative Language • Oxymoron – phrase in which two words of contradictory meaning are used together for special effect • Paradox – a statement, proposition, or situation that seems to be absurd, or contradictory, but in fact is or may be true (Standing is more tiring than walking)

8. Figurative Language • Metaphor – when one thing is spoken of as though it were something else • Extended Metaphor – different in that several comparisons are made, and/or are sustained for several lines • Imagery – product of figurative language – when words create pictures – use details of sight, sound, taste, smell, touch, and movement

9. Poetic Forms • Sonnet – a fourteen line lyric poem • Lyric – musical verse that expresses the observations and feelings of a single speaker (you will be creating one of these) • Blank Verse – unrhymed poetry • Free Verse – poetry not written in a regular rhythmical pattern, or meter

10. Poetic Forms • Haiku – a three line verse, where 1st & 3rd lines contain five syllables, & 2nd line has seven syllables – they seek to convey a single vivid emotion by means of images from nature (you will create 4 of these) • Narrative – a poem that tells a story • Dramatic – uses the techniques of drama – creates the illusion that the reader is actually witnessing a dramatic event

11. Strategies for Reading Poetry • 1) Listen – one of the things that distinguishes poetry from prose is its sound. Poetry is usually meant to be read aloud; only by doing so will you hear the music of the poet’s words.

12. Strategies for Reading Poetry • 2) Identify the speaker – when you read a poem, you are hearing the voice of the speaker of the poem. The speaker is not necessarily the poet, although it can be or it may be a character. Determine who you think is “telling” the poem, and try to determine his or her perspective on the situation in the poem. Recognizing the speaker and his/her perspective will give you insight into the meaning of the poem.

13. Strategies for Reading Poetry • 3) Read in sentences – keep in mind that even if a poem is shaped to fit a particular rhythm and rhyme, the words are usually put together and punctuated as sentences. Do not stop at the end of each line unless a punctuation mark (period, comma, colon, semicolon, or dash) stops you.

14. Strategies for Reading Poetry • 4) Picture the imagery – use your senses to experience the poem. To appreciate the images a poet uses, form mental pictures based on the words in the poem. When you form mental pictures, you use your memory and imagination to see, feel, hear, smell, & taste what the poet describes.

15. Keep An Open Mind • You may never be able to appreciate poetry if you can not approach it with an open mind. Many people love music but say they hate poetry. Music IS poetry. Give it a chance, you may find you enjoy it!