Poetry Terms

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What are the five terms commonly associated with figuration?

Back 1

metaphor, simile, metonymy, synechdoche, irony

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metaphor

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comparison not using like or as

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tenor

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the "real" thing which is taking on "unreal" characteristics of another object in a comparison: my brother (tenor) is a bear (vehicle)

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vehicle

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the "imagined" thing whose characteristics you are applying to a thing or person at hand: my brother (tenor) is a bear (vehicle)

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metonymy

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substitution of cause for effect/a related thing but not a part: London is working on the hijacking situation (meaning government)

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simile

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comparison using like or as: the sun was like a bright rose

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acatalectic

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a sort of useless term meaning that the feet have the prescribed number of syllables (iambic pentameter acatalectic is a redundant term)

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accentual verse

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fixed number of accents per line, but could be many more syllables e.g. "/baa baa /black sheep /have you any /wool? /yes sir /yes sir, /three bags /full"

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acephalous line

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does not conform to prescribed meter because first syllable is missing

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acritic songs

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from GRK: frontiersman songs: are the heroic or epic poetry that emerged from 10th century Byzantium, inspired by the almost continuous state of warfare with the Arabs in eastern Asia Minor.

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acrostic

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(from the late Greek akróstichis, from ákros, "top", and stíchos, "verse") is a poem or other form of writing in an alphabetic script, in which the first letter, syllable or word of each line, paragraph or other recurring feature in the text spells out a word or a message.

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adonic

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is a unit of Aeolic verse, a five-syllable metrical foot consisting of a dactyl followed by a trochee. The last line of a Sapphic stanza is an adonic

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adynation

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(from Greek: a-: without and dynasthai: to be powerful) is a figure of speech in the form of hyperbole taken to such extreme lengths as to suggest a complete impossibility: (sooner would he pass a camel through the eye of a needle than enter the kingdom of heaven...)

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aisling

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(Irish for 'dream', pronounced [ˈaʃlʲənʲ]), or vision poem, is a poetic genre that developed during the late 17th and 18th centuries in Irish language poetry. The word may have a number of variations in pronunciation, however, in the Irish language the first syllable always includes a [ʃ] ("sh") sound

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alba

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("sunrise") is a subgenre of Occitan lyric poetry. It describes the longing of lovers who, having passed a night together, must separate for fear of being discovered by their respective spouses

Front 16

what are the names of the three greek accents?

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longum (long) breve (short) and anaceps (irrational, free, whatever is needed)

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alexandrines

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In syllabic verse, such as that used in French literature, an alexandrine is a line of twelve syllables. Most commonly, the line is divided into two equal parts by a caesura between the sixth and seventh syllables. Alternatively, the line is divided into three four-syllable sections by two caesuras.

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altar poem

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is any type of poetry where the characters, words, and lines have been written in such a way that when looked at as a whole, the poem forms an outline that is easily recognizable to the reader. The object that is outlined must be related to the poetry and usually gives more meaning to the poem itself. (super cheesy style of poetry)

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amphibrach

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short long short -- used in limericks and Russian poetry...is a metrical foot used in Latin and Greek prosody. It consists of a long syllable between two short syllables. The word comes from the Greek αμφίβραχυς, amphíbrakhys, "short on both sides".

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anacrusis

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lead-in syllable before actual meter begins: *Oh*, Say can you see? Any dead bugs on me?

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anagrammatic

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is poetry with the constrained form that either each line or each verse is an anagram of all other lines or verses in the poem

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anapest

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In classical quantitative meters it consists of two short syllables followed by a long one (as in a-na-paest); in accentual stress meters it consists of two unstressed syllables followed by one stressed syllable.

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anisometric

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poetic verse which does not have any corresponding poetic meter. A stanza of this sort is mostly lines of unequal numbers of matching length in terms of how many meters, which can also be termed as mixed stanzas.

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antilabe

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is a technique in drama or poetry, in which a single verse line is distributed on two or more characters, voices, or entities.

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antistrophe

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is the portion of an ode sung by the chorus in its returning movement from west to east, in response to the strophe, which was sung from east to west.

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aubade

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poem about lovers separating at dawn

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ballad

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Most, but not all northern and west European ballads are written in ballad stanzas or quatrains (four line stanzas) of alternating lines of iambic (an unstressed followed by a stressed syllable) tetrameter (eight syllables) and iambic trimeter (six syllables), known as ballad meter

Front 28

What famous poem employs the ballad stanza?

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Samuel Taylor Coleridge adopted the ballad stanza in The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, alternating eight and six syllable lines.

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ballade

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not to be confused with ballad: is a verse form typically consisting of three eight-line stanzas.The last line in the stanza is a refrain, and the stanzas are followed by a four-line concluding stanza (an envoi) usually addressed to a prince. The rhyme scheme is therefore usually 'ababbcbC ababbcbC ababbcbC bcbC', where the capital 'C' is a refrain.

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bouts-rimes

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"lists of words that rhyme to one another, drawn up by another hand, and given to a poet, who was to make a poem to the rhymes in the same order that they were placed upon the list."

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bref double

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s a French poetic form consisting of 3 quatrains and a final couplet, making 14 lines.

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brevis in longo

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short accent in place of a long accent:

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burns stanza

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The stanza is six lines in length and rhymes aaabab, with tetrameter a lines and dimeter b lines. The second b line may or may not be repeated. (burns did not invent this, he just used it)

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cadae

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stanza based on the number Pi. Super nerdy. The form of a cadae is based on Pi on two levels. There are five stanzas, with 3, 1, 4, 1, and 5 lines each, respectively. Each line of the poem also contains an appropriate number of syllables. The first line has three syllables, the second has one, the third has four, etc.

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caesura

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is a term to denote an audible pause that breaks up a line of verse. In most cases, caesura is indicated by punctuation marks which cause a pause in speech: a comma, a semicolon, a full stop, a dash, etc. Punctuation, however, is not necessary for a caesura to occur.

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calligram

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is a poem, phrase, or word in which the typeface, calligraphy or handwriting is arranged in a way that creates a visual image. appolinaire. NOT an altar poem.

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canso (song)

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Song by troubadours in three parts: The first stanza is the exordium, where the composer explains his purpose. The main body of the song occurs in the following stanzas, and usually draw out a variety of relationships with the exordium. The canso can end with either a tornada or envoi. This part usually bring the piece to some form of resolution. A tornada is a shortened stanza, containing only a latter part of the standard stanza used up to that point. Some cansos contain more the one tornada.

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cantiga de amigo

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literally a "song about a boyfriend", is a genre of medieval erotic lyric poetry, apparently rooted in a song tradition native to the northwest quadrant of the Iberian Peninsula. What mainly distinguishes the cantiga de amigo is its focus on a world of female-voiced communication.

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carmen

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In Ancient Rome, the term "carmen" was generally used to signify a verse; but in its proper sense, it referred to a spell or prayer, form of expiation, execration, etc.

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catalectic

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catalectic line is a metrically incomplete line of verse, lacking a syllable at the end or ending with an incomplete foot. One form of catalexis is headlessness, where the unstressed syllable is dropped from the beginning of the line.

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headlessness

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One form of catalexis is headlessness, where the unstressed syllable is dropped from the beginning of the line.

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caudate sonnet

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is an expanded version of the sonnet. It consists of 14 lines in standard sonnet forms followed by a coda (Latin cauda meaning "tail", from which the name is derived). invented by francisco berni

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cento

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is a work wholly composed of verses or passages taken from other authors; only disposed in a new form or order.

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chain rhyme

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is the linking together of stanzas by carrying a rhyme over from one stanza to the next. e.g. terza rima, aabaab bccbcc cddcdd etc.

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what are the five chivalric epics?

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chanson de geste: roman courtois, matter of britain, matter of france and acritic songs

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choliambic verse

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x - u - | x - u - | u - - -

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cinquain

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anything with five line stanza -- there are many kinds

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what are the five types of cinquains?

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reverse, mirror, butterfly, crown, garland

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tetraktis

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is five-line poem of 20 syllables with a title, arranged in the following order: 1,2,3,4,10.with each line standing as a phrase on its own.It can be inverted,doubled etc and was created by the late English poet Ray Stebbings

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cinqku

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five lines with a total of 17 syllables, no title, and a surprise or turn occurring in either line 4 or line 5.

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clerihew

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is a whimsical, four-line biographical poem invented by Edmund Clerihew Bentley. The lines are comically irregular in length, and the rhymes, often contrived, are structured AABB.

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closed couplet

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are two line units of verse that do not extend their sense beyond the line's end.

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heroic couplet

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lines in iambic pentameter

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common meter

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is a poetic meter consisting of four lines which alternate between iambic tetrameter (four metrical feet per line, with each foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable) and iambic trimeter (three metrical feet per line, with each foot consisting of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable), rhyming in the pattern a-b-a-b.

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country house poem

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poem in which poet compliments patron with description of his country house (!) from 17th century England

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topographical poem

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description of a landscape

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couplet

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It usually consists of two lines that rhyme and have the same meter. While traditionally couplets rhyme, not all do. A poem may use white space to mark out couplets if they do not rhyme. Couplets with a meter of iambic pentameter are called heroic couplets. The Poetic epigram is also in the couplet form. Couplets can also appear in more complex rhyme schemes. For example, Shakespearean sonnets end with a couplet.

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crown of sonnets

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or sonnet corona is a sequence of sonnets, usually addressed to some one person, and/or concerned with a single theme.

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cumulative song

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is a song whose verses are built from earlier verses, usually by adding a new stanza to the previous verse. (12 days of christmas)

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curtal sonnet

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10.5 line sonnet invented by Gerard Manley Hopkins