Poetry Terms Set Two: Examples

Front 1

Assonance

Back 1

And so, all the nIght-tIde, I lIe down bY the sIde
Of mY darling, mY darling, mY lIfe and my brIde.
--Edgar Allan Poe, "Annabel Lee"

Front 2

Allegory

Back 2

An example of this would be the story of the Stallin era and the events leading up to WWII hidden behind the animals in Animal Farm.

Front 3

Aubade

Back 3

‘Tis true, ‘tis day, what though it be?
O wilt thou therefore rise from me?
Why should we rise because ‘tis light?
Did we lie down because ‘twas night?
Love, which in spite of darkness brought us hither,
Should in despite of light keep us together.
--John Donne, "Break of Day"

Front 4

Caesura

Back 4

Alas how changed! || What sudden horrors rise!
A naked lover || bound and bleeding lies!
Where, where was Eloise? || her voice, her hand,
Her poniard, || had opposed the dire command.
--Alexander Pope, "Eloisa to Abelard"

Front 5

Closed form

Back 5

I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
I feel my fate in what I cannot fear.
I learn by going where I have to go.

We think by feeling. What is there to know?
I hear my being dance from ear to ear.
I wake to sleep, and take my waking slow.
--Theodore Roethke, "The Waking"

Front 6

Denotation

Back 6

The ______ of the word home would be:
Home- the place where one lives.

Whereas the connotative definition may be:
Home- the place where one feels most comfortable, safe, and accepted.

Front 7

Denouement

Back 7

Slim telling George, “You hadda, George. I swear you hadda,” followed by an invitation to go get a drink after George kills Lennie is the _________ of the story.

Front 8

Elegy

Back 8

The curfew tolls the knell of parting day,
The lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And leaves the world to darkness and to me.
--Thomas Gray, "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard"

Front 9

Enjambment

Back 9

think that I shall never SEE
A poem lovely as a tree.

A tree whose hungry mouth is PREST
Against the sweet earth's flowing breast;

A tree that looks at God all day,
And lifts her leafy arms to pray;

A tree that may in summer WEAR
A nest of robins in her hair;

Upon whose bosom snow has lain;
Who intimately lives with rain.

Poems are made by fools like me,
But only God can make a tree.
--Joyce Kilmer, "Trees"

Front 10

Epigram

Back 10

I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox

and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast

Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold
--William Carlos Williams, "This Is Just To Say"

Front 11

Foil

Back 11

In the Sherlock Holmes stories, Doctor Watson is this; he highlights the brilliance in Holmes.

Front 12

Lyric poem

Back 12

Turn back the heart you've turned away
Give back your kissing breath
Leave not my love as you have left
The broken hearts of yesterday
But wait, be still, don't lose this way
Affection now, for what you guess
May be something more, could be less
Accept my love, live for today.”
“Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate:
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date:
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed.
--James DeFord, "Italian Sonnet"

Front 13

Quatrain

Back 13

The sense of danger must not disappear:
The way is certainly both short and steep,
However gradual it looks from here;
Look if you like, but you will have to leap.
--W.H. Auden, "Leap Before You Look"

Front 14

Satire

Back 14

Has this ever happened to you?
You work very horde on a paper for English clash
And then get a very glow raid (like a D or even a D=)
and all because you are the word¹s liverwurst spoiler.
Proofreading your peppers is a matter of the the utmost impotence.

This is a problem that affects manly, manly students.
I myself was such a bed spiller once upon a term
that my English teacher in my sophomoric year,
Mrs. Myth, said I would never get into a good colleague.
And that¹s all I wanted, just to get into a good colleague.
Not just anal community colleague,
because I wouldn¹t be happy at anal community colleague.
I needed a place that would offer me intellectual simulation,
I really need to be challenged, challenged menstrually.
I know this makes me sound like a stereo,
but I really wanted to go to an ivory legal colleague.
So I needed to improvement
or gone would be my dream of going to Harvard, Jail, or Prison
(in Prison, New Jersey).
--Taylor Mali, "The Importance of Proofreading"

Front 15

Sonnet

Back 15

Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance, or nature's changing course, untrimmed;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade,
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest,
Nor shall death brag thou wanderest in his shade,
When in eternal lines to time thou growest.
So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,
So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.
--William Shakespeare, "Sonnet #18"

Front 16

Sestet

Back 16

So answerest thou; but why not rather say: (A)
"Hath man no second life? - Pitch this one high! (B)
Sits there no judge in Heaven, our sin to see? - (C)
More strictly, then, the inward judge obey! (A)
Was Christ a man like us? Ah! let us try (B)
If we then, too, can be such men as he!" (C)
--Matthew Arnold, "The Better Part"

Front 17

Sestina

Back 17

Here in this bleak city of Rochester,
Where there are twenty-seven words for "snow,"
Not all of them polite, the wayward mind
Basks in some Yucatan of its own making,
Some coppery, sleek lagoon, or cinnamon island
Alive with lemon tints and burnished natives,

And O that we were there. But here the natives
Of this grey, sunless city of Rochester
Have sown whole mines of salt about their land
(Bare ruined Carthage that it is) while snow
Comes down as if The Flood were in the making.
Yet on that ocean Marvell called the mind

An ark sets forth which is itself the mind,
Bound for some pungent green, some shore whose natives
Blend coriander, cayenne, mint in making
Roasts that would gladden the Earl of Rochester
With sinfulness, and melt a polar snow.
It might be well to remember that an island

Was blessed heaven once, more than an island,
The grand, utopian dream of a noble mind.
In that kind climate the mere thought of snow
Was but a wedding cake; the youthful natives,
Unable to conceive of Rochester,
Made lo

Front 18

Spondee

Back 18

WELL-LOVED of me, discerning to fulfill
THIS LAbour, by SLOW PRUdence to MAKE MILD
--G.K. Chesterton, "Lepanto"

Front 19

Synecdoche

Back 19

Saying "wheels" when referring to a car.

Front 20

Syntax

Back 20

The boy wears the shoes
vs.
The shoes are worn by the boy.