Poetry!

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Alliteration

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the repetition of consonant sounds at the beginning of successful words (initial alliteration) and within adjacent words (internal alliteration)

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Anapest

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an irregular poetic foot comprising two unaccented syllables followed by an accented syllable

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Apostrophe

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a special, performative instance of prosopopoeia that addresses an inanimate thing or a person who is absent or deceased; invokes personified meaning in human terms

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Assonance

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repetition of vowel sounds in a line; occurs within words and bears an aural character

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Blank verse

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unrhymed iambic pentameter; imposes the rigor of metrical composition

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Cacophony

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sounds that are unpleasant and grating

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Caesura

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a pause;

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Consonance

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the repetition of the initial and terminal consonants surrounding a medial vowel

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Couplet

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pairs of rhyming lines

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Dactyl

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a poetic foot comprising one accented syllable followed by two unaccented syllables (opposite of anapest)

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Dimeter

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two feet per line

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End rhyme

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a rhyme that comes at the end of a line of verse

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English/Shakespearean sonnet

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consists of three quatrains and an independently rhymed couplet (abab cdcd efef gg)

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Enjambment

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the movement of syntactic phrasing from the end of one line to the beginning of the next

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Euphony

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the impression of sounds that are pleasing to the ear

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Free verse

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a kind of poetry that varies line length, typography, rhythms, and stanza patterns to fit the particular style and content of the work at hand

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Fricatives

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the harsh, rasping sounds (h, f, c, th, dh)

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Heptameter

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seven feet per line length

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Hexameter

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Six foot lines

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Iamb

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made up of an unaccented and an accented syllable

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Internal rhyme

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a pair of words that rhyme within and across adjacent lines

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Irony

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a situation (dramatic irony) or phrasing (verbal irony) that performs something contrary to expectation. Dramatic irony occurs when the audience knows more about an incident than a character in a play does.

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Italian sonnet

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A sonnet consisting of an octave rhyming abba abba and a sestet rhyming cde cde

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Liquids

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the r and l that roll in a flowing movement off the tongue

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Metaphor

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figurative language that compares one word or thing in terms of another word or thing by way of direct transference

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Metonymy

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describes a word substituted for another word or thing that we associate with it

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Monometer

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lines comprising of two syllables each in one-foot units

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Nasals

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the m, n, and ng sound

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Octave

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the first eight lines of a sonnet

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Onomatopeia

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Verbal sounds that are meant to mimic things imaginatively heard in the world

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Oxymoron

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a rhetorical figure that combines contradictory terms—a blending of opposites: deafening silence, living death, solemn gaiety

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Parataxis

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a technique in which images are set directly side-by-side. In experimental film, this might be a quick cut from one scene or image to another; in poetry, setting phrases side by side without an obvious or logical connection.

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Pattern Poem

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a version of fixed form verse that presents the typography and arrangement of lines on the page as a visual icon for its subject matter (“Swan and Shadow” by John Hollander p.141)

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Five feet per line

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five feet per line

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Personification

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a figure of speech in which nonhuman objects or created are endowed with human characteristics

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Plosives

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the hard p, b, t, d, k, g sounds or stops

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Pyrrhic

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a metrical foot comprising two unaccented syllables

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Quatrain

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a four line stanza unit

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Sestet

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The final six lines of a poem

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Simile

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A figure of speech that makes an explicit comparison between two things through the linking terms like or as

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Spenserian Sonnet

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a sonnet that takes the rhyme scheme of abab bcbc cdcd ee

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Spondee

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the irregular foot that accents both syllables

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Synecdoche

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a type of metonymy that substitutes a part of something for the whole designated
I.e. sailors or laborers are referred to as “hands” as in “all hands on deck”

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Tercet

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a group of three lines of verse, often rhyming together or with another triplet

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Terza ring

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: a well-known tercet pattern that takes the middle rhyme of each stanza and uses it as the envelope frame for the next stanza unit to rhyme (aba bcb cdc)

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Tetrameter

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Four feet per line

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Trimeter

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Lines made up of three feet each

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Trochee

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The accent falls on the first syllable rather than the second of the iamb

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Villanelle

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a nineteen line form with five tercets and a final quatrain; the rhyme scheme describes a series of repeated refrain lines that reflect the form’s origins in the circular returns of a folk dance (i.e. A1bA2 abA1 abA2 abA1 abA2 abA1A2)