INTRODUCTION TO POETRY
Introduction to Poetry
Poetry has remained a vital part of art and culture.
Like other forms of literature, poetry is made to express
thoughts and emotions in a creative and imaginative way.
It conveys thoughts and feelings, describes a scene or tells a
story in a concentrated, lyrical arrangement of words.
Life is something we all share,
Just like oxygen in the air.
The way we live it, is up to us,
With a negative or with a plus.
Life is something we should cherish,
We never know when we’ll perish.
Live each and every single day,
Smell the flowers, stop and play.
Life is something we’ve been blessed,
Choice is yours; choose your quest.
Follow your passions, and you’ll be fine,
With the right attitude, you will shine.
Three most common types of poetry according to form:
1.Lyric Poetry
2. Narrative Poetry
3. Descriptive Poetry
Three most common types of poetry according to form:
1. Lyric Poetry- It is any poem with one speaker who expresses strong thoughts
and feelings. Most poems, especially modern ones, are lyric poems. Below are
some types of lyric poetry.
A. Ode- An ode is a lyric poem that praises an individual, an idea or an
event. The length is usually moderate, the subject is serious, the style is
elevated and the stanza pattern is elaborate. In Ancient Greece, odes
were originally accompanied by music. In fact, the word “ode” comes
from the Greek word “aeidein”, which means to sing or to dance.
B. Elegy- is written to mourn for the dead.
C. Sonnet. It is a lyric poem consisting of 14 lines and, in the English
version, is usually written in iambic pentameter.
Three most common types of poetry according to form:
2. Narrative Poetry- It is a poem that tells a story; its structure resembles the
plot line of a story i.e. the introduction of conflict and characters, rising
action, climax and the denouement.
The most common types of narrative poetry are ballad and epic
A. Ballad- It is a narrative poem that has a musical rhythm and can be
sung. A ballad is usually organized into quatrains or cinquains, it has a simple
rhythm structure, and tells the tales of ordinary people.
Example: Excerpt from “Annabel Lee” by Edgar Allan Poe
B. Epic- It is a long narrative poem in elevated style recounting the
deeds of a legendary or historical hero.
Examples of epic include Iliad by Homer, Beowulf, The Divine Comedy by Dante
Alighieri, Metamorphoses by Ovid and many more.
3. Descriptive Poetry- It is a poem that describes the world that surrounds the
speaker. It uses elaborate imagery and adjectives. While emotional, it is more
"outward-focused" than lyric poetry, which is more personal and introspective.
OTHER FORMS OF POETRY
1. Haiku- It has an unrhymed verse form having
three lines (a tercet) and usually 5,7,5 syllables,
respectively. It is usually considered a lyric
poem.
HAIKU
2. Limerick- It has a very structured poem, usually humorous &
composed of five lines.
3. Acrostic poems- also known as name poems, spell out names or
words with the first letter in each line. While the author is doing
this, they're describing someone or something they deem important.
CHARACTERISTICS OF POETRY
IMAGINATIVE- poetry is imaginative in nature as its entails the
writer/poet to use his imagination to come up with a scene that
he aims to portray using his words.
UNIQUE- since part of the factors that influence a writer to come
up with poetry (or any literary piece) is his/her experience and
ideas it can be said that each poem is unique.
Uses IMAGERY- allows the poets to paint pictures and include
elements that appeal to the senses.
CHARACTERISTICS OF POETRY
THOUGHT PROVOKING- Poetry tend to reflect the personal
insights and ideas to the writers; its contents are open to the
interpretation of the reader.
TRIGERS EMOTIONAL RESPONSE- let the reader able to relate to
the theme presented by the writer in the poem
Use of Rhythm- is a systematic variation in flow of sound.
Heightened use of sound- rhyme is a device that ends two lines
with the same sound.
LANGUAGE OF POETRY
Levels of Usage deals with personal feelings and insights.
Appropriate words and phrases not fancy ones.
IMAGERY IN POETRY WRITING
Imagery refers to the mental pictures or visualizations that reader’s
experience when reading literature.
Writers use imagery to convey feelings that are often difficult to describe in
mere words.
Creating Imagery involves using all of your senses: sight, sound, smell,
taste, touch. You can find Imagery for a poem all around you.
Using the senses allows the reader to see, to hear, to smell, to taste and to
feel the image that you are describing.
Imagery is SPECIFIC. It provokes an IMAGE in the reader’s mind.
IMAGERY IS…
Part of the poet’s style
A product of the poets own way of seeing the world
A reflection of the time and place in which the poet lives
POET’S ALSO use imagery to
Speak to our deepest feelings- joy, sorrow, wonder, love
Emphasize certain qualities of a subject
Create mode
Images as figures of speech
SIMILE AND METAPHOR
Tenor – describes the poet’s actual subject of concern.
Vehicle – the image associated with it.
TENOR SUBJECT or TARGET
VEHICLE Words carrying the
COMPARISON
The girl is like a lovely rose.
TENOR VEHICLE
The woman’s lips are red roses.
TENOR VEHICLE
THE SOUND OF WORDS IN POETRY WRITING
Sound devices help readers develop strong visual images, reinforcing the
mood and tone of the literary devices.
Writers use sound device to emphasize the words through the skillful use of
the sounds with in the lines in the poems.
Rhyme a device which consists of two or more words linked by an identity in
sound which begins with an accented vowel and continues to the end of each
word.
Nonrhyming Devices
o Alliteration
o Assonance
o Consonance
o Onomatopoiea
ELEMENTS OF POETRY
1. METER- in poetry means the pattern of stressed and unstressed
syllables found in a poem.
how many times in one line are there unstressed/stressed
syllables
SYLLABLES- is a unit of pronunciation having one vowel sound,
with or without surrounding consonants, forming the whole or a
part of a word.
Example:
Wa / ter = water
In / fer / no = Inferno
Ig / nite =Ignite
So
Long
Stressed syllables:
longer
louder
higher
water inferno ignite
Unstressed:
shorter
Quieter
lower
banana
I wandered lonely as a cloud
When one scans a poem determining its metrical
patter one uses:
(/)- slant line for stressed or accented syllables
(u)- small u for unstressed or slack syllables
Types of feet used in English poetry:
1. Iamb – refers to a weak ( unstressed) syllables followed by a
strong stressed syllable
u/u/u/u/
I think that I shall never see
Unstressed, stressed
belong
today
destroy
delay
2. Trochee- stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable
/u/u/u/u
Tell me not in mournful numbers
stressed, unstressed
Fragile
Ankle
Fruitful
panther
3. Anapest – two unstressed syllables followed by a stressed syllable
uu/uu/uu/
On this night of all nights of the year
4. Dactyl- refers to a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed
syllables
/uu
I’m not it
5. Pyrrhic- two unstressed syllbles
uu
rat-tle
6. Spondee- two stressed syllables
//
Deep-sea
2. STANZA- Stanzas refer to series of lines grouped together and
separated by a space from other stanzas. They correspond to a
paragraph in an essay. Identifying the stanza is done by counting the
number of lines.
Terms used to refer to the number of stanzas:
monostich (1 line)
couplet (2 lines)
tercet (3 lines)
quatrain (4 lines)
cinquain (5 lines)
sestet (6 lines) (sometimes it's called a sexain)
septet (7 lines),
octave (8 lines).
3. LINES
A line is a subdivision of a poem, specifically a group of words
arranged into a row that ends for a reason other than the right-hand
margin. This reason could be that the lines are arranged to have a
certain number of syllables, a certain number of stresses, or of
metrical feet; it could be that they are arranged so that they
rhyme, whether they be of equal length or not.
Lines of poems are often organized into stanzas, or verses, which
are denominated by the number of lines included. Thus a collection
of two lines is a couplet (or distich), three lines a triplet (or tercet),
four lines a quatrain, and so on.
4. RHYME- The word “rhyme” refers to the pattern of similar sounding
words used in writing.
Likeness of Sounds
A poem without a rhyme is a BLANK VERSE
TYPES OF RHYME
Based on:
Position
Syllable count
Likeness of sound
TYPES OF RHYME
1. END RHYME- The most common type of rhyme which can be found
at the end of the lines.
2. INTERNAL/LEONINE RHYME- the rhyme which can be found in
between two or more words in a single line.
3. MASCULINE RHYME- pertains to rhyme based on the number of
syllables. The rhyme consisting of a single stressed syllable, as in “car”
and “far”.
TYPES OF RHYME
4. FEMININE RHYME- the rhyme consisting of a stressed syllable
followed by an unstressed syllable in “mother” and “father”.
5. PERFECT RHYME- the exact match of sounds in a rhyme , as in “
ask” and “task”
6. SLANT RHYME- the imperfect rhyme, also called oblique rhyme of
off rhyme, wherein the sounds are similar but not exactly the same, as
in “port” and “heart”.
ELEMENTS OF POETRY
5. RHYTHYM- can be thought of as the beat or the flow/pace of a
poem. It is made up of beat and repetition, so it usually refers to
features of sound. It is created by stressed and unstressed syllables
in a line or a verse.
6. RHYME SCHEME- A rhyme scheme is the pattern according to
which end rhymes (rhymes located at the end of lines) are repeated
in works poetry. Rhyme schemes are described using letters of the
alphabet, such that all the lines in a poem that rhyme with each
other are assigned a letter, beginning with "A."
7. TONE
Overall impression the poem makes
The emotion conveyed by the poem
Affected by the writer’s choice of words
8. THEME
The main idea or GENERAL TOPIC of the poem
Common themes:
Love
Family
Revenge
Inspiration
Overcoming Fears
9. LESSON
The MORAL or value that we can get in a poem.
