Some write each line of a meters.

Elements poem at the scansion: the analysis of

of top of a separate sheet of meter and its variations
Poetry paper, so that he would in
Michael Clay Thompson have poetry.
Those who are not well room below to foot: a unit of meter
acquainted with good laboriously with
poetry solve the poetic two or three syllables of
might imagine that problems of which
poetry is a the line. Only when he one is usually stressed.
spontaneous emotional had iambic foot: a two-
production, involving finished each line did he syllable
perhaps reassemble the lines into foot with the stress on
some rhyme, but relying a the
largely on intuition and poem. second. It is the most
fortuitous accident, the Ironically, the one poetic common
muse, technique that everyone foot in English poetry:
for the details of genius immediately associates -/
which with trochaic foot: a
make great poems great. poetry, rhyme, is twosyllable foot with the
Actually, poets work in probably the stress on
a one that is least used in the first: /- Trochees
manner more similar to modern poetry. Instead, are often
great most used to suggest evil, as
composers; there is a modern poets use far in the
current subtler trochaic tetrameter of
of inspired genius, but and less obvious Shakespeare’s witches
this techniques to in
genius is worked out in create—and conceal— Macbeth: “Double,
meticulous professional their art. double, toil
detail. Many of them are and trouble,” or in the
Just as a composer explained trochaic
consciously places each below. octameter of Poe’s
separate note of a Meter “Raven”:
symphony meter: the pattern of “Once upon a midnight
on musical staff, so a stressed (accented, long) dreary, while I
poet and pondered, weak
consciously controls unstressed (unaccented, and weary.”
each short) anapestic foot: a
separate vowel and syllables in poetry. threesyllable foot with
consonant cadence: rhythm not stress on the
sound, organizing them truly third: --/
within regular. Walt Whitman dactylic foot: a
the structure of rhythm. wrote threesyllable foot with
Dylan Thomas’s habit in cadences rather than stress on the
was to in first: /--
spondaic foot: a spondee Manley Hopkins’s term closed couplet. Two
is two stressed syllables: for successive rhyming
// variable meter verses with
pyrrhic foot: two combining a a complete thought
unstressed syllables, --. stressed syllable with within the
Rare. any two lines. Usually
dipodic foot: a number of unstressed iambic
foursyllable foot syllables. pentameter.
consisting of an Copyright 2006, Royal terza rima: a three-line
unaccented, lightly Fireworks Press stanza with an
accented, www.rfwp.comStanza interwoven
unaccented, and heavily stanza: a division of a rhyme scheme: aba, bcb,
accented syllable. poem based on thought cdc,
anacrusis: prefixing an or ded, etc. Usually iambic
unstressed syllable to a form. Stanzas based on pentameter. Shelley’s
line of form “Ode
which it forms no are shown by their to The West Wind”
metrical rhyme limerick: a five-line
part: Sport that scheme. nonsense poem in
wrinkled Care verso: a line of a poem. anapest,
derides / And Laughter arte menor: 1-8 syllables aabba. Lines 1,2, and 5
holding both his sides. per line of poetry. have 3
feminine ending: a final arte mayor: 9 or more feet; lines 3 and 4 have
unstressed syllable syllables per line of only
appended poetry. two.
to an iambic or anapestic couplet: a two-line ballad: four lines, abcb,
line. stanza, lines 1 and 3 are iambic
To be or not to be, that aa. tetrameter, and lines 2
is the triplet: a three-line and 4
question. stanza, are iambic trimeter.
catalexis: dropping one aaa. ode: a complex, long
or two unaccented quatrain: a four-line lyric
syllables stanza, aaaa, abab, abba, poem, in formal style,
from the end of a line-- aabb, on a
necessarily a trochaic or abac. sublime subject.
dactylic line. Dust thou quintet: a five-line Shelley’s
art to stanza. “Ode to the West Wind”
dust returnest / Was not sestet: a six-line stanza. is
spoken of the soul. septet: a seven-line an example.
metrical lines: stanza. elegy: a poem mourning
monometer, dimeter, octave: an eight-line the
trimeter, stanza. death of someone.
tetrameter, pentameter, nine-line, ten-line, etc., allegory: a story in
hexameter, heptameter, stanzas: which
octameter. heroic couplet: Also characters represent
sprung rhythm: Gerard called abstract
values or ideas, such as stanza in iambic with each other or with
John pentameter. the
Bunyan’s Pilgrim’s Italian or Petrarchan lines of an adjoining
Progress. sonnet: a sonnet with an tercet.
There is a meaning octave and a sestet, Shakespeare concluded
below the abbaabba “The
surface of the story. and cdecde or cdcdcd. Phoenix and the Turtle”
rime royal: seven lines The with
of octave makes a five tercets. Sestets
iambic pentameter, statement or rhyming
ababbcc. states a problem, and the cdecde contain two
Named because King sestet tercets.
James I makes a summary of rondel: a fourteen-line
of Scotland used it. gives a poem rhyming
ottava rima: eight lines solution. abbaabababbaab. Lines
of English or 7 and
iambic pentameter, Shakespearean sonnet: 8 and lines 13 and 14
abababcc. three repeat
From the Italians. quatrains and a couplet, lines 1 and 2.
Spenserian stanza: a abab distich: a couplet.
nineline stanza cdcd efef gg. canto: a section or
consisting of eight villanelle: a poem of division
iambic pentameter lines five of a long poem, such as
followed by an tercets, all rhyming aba, the
alexandrine, and a cantos of the Divine
ababbcbcc. Named for concluding quatrain, Comedy
Edmund Spenser, who rhyming or Don Juan.
invented this form for abaa. Lines 6, 12, and Rhyme and
his 18 Sound
"Faerie Queene." repeat line one; lines 9, rhymed verse: verse
alexandrine: a line of 15, with
iambic hexameter. The and 19 repeat line 3. end rhyme and usually
ninth Theodore Roethke’s regular
line of a Spenserian “The meter.
stanza is Waking” is a nearly blank verse: iambic
an alexandrine. perfect pentameter without end
haiku: a three-line poem villanelle. Dylan rhyme.
of 5, 7, and 5 syllables, Thomas’s free verse: verse with
unrhymed, concerning "Do Not Go Gentle into no
nature, That regular meter and no end
and presenting Good Night” is a rhyme.
juxtaposed villanelle. rhyme: a similarity of
images which are tercet: a three-line sound between two
uninterpreted. stanza words.
sonnet: a fourteen-line in which all lines rhyme True rhyme is identical
either
sounding stressed
syllables in
which the letters before
the
vowel sounds are
different.
end rhyme: rhyme at the
ends of the lines in a
stanza.
Copyright 2006, Royal
Fireworks Press
www.rfwp.cominternal
rhyme: rhyme
within a line of poetry.
masculine rhyme:
onesyllable rhyme.
feminine or double
rhyme: two-syllable
rhyme.
triple rhyme:
threesyllable rhyme.
leonine rhyme: a scheme
in which the word
preceding a
caesura rhymes with the
last
word of the line: I bring
fresh
showers // for the
thirsting
flowers.
rhyme scheme: the
pattern
of end rhyme. Sounds
are
identified by letters,
aabb, abab,
abc abc, etc.
reversal: sense/madness,
Emily Dickinson
alliteration: repetition of
the initial letter or
sound.
assonance: repetition of
a enjambed.
vowel sound.
consonance: repetition
of a
consonant sound.
onomatopoeia: word
imitation of natural
sound.
The words whippoorwill
and
bang are examples.
repetition: reiterating of
a figure of speech:
word or phrase in a
poem.
incremental repetition:
the repetition of a line or
lines,
but with a variation each
time
that advances the
narrative.
refrain: repetition of one
or
more phrases or lines at
intervals.
elision: running together
of
vowels in adjacent
words in
order to eliminate a
syllable:
th’eternal.
eye-rhyme: words or
syllables spelled alike
but
pronounced differently:
some
and home.
approximate rime: near
rime, imperfect rime,
slant rime,
oblique rime.
enjambment: running of
one line into another.
end-stopped: lines not
caesura: a break in the
middle of a line of five
or more
feet. Represented by the
syllable //. To err is
human, //
to forgive, divine.
Shakespeare’s Sonnet
29:
Haply I think on thee—.
Ideas
nonliteral
expression
simile: a like or as
comparison. He swims
like a
fish.
epic simile or Homeric
simile: a simile as
found in
Homer’s Iliad, in which
the
poet compares
something in
his poem to an
elaborately
described scene, such as
hunters and dogs in
pursuit of
a lion or stag.
metaphor: an implied
comparison. He is a
fish.
Whitman’s poem about
the
death of Lincoln refers
to
Lincoln as Captain.
extended metaphor: an
elaborate comparison;
much
longer than the typical
onephrase or one-clause
metaphor.
personification:
describing inhuman something in literature
things in or
human terms. The sad history. Yeats’s “No
fish. Second
synecdoche: letting a Troy,” or Keats’s
part “Chapman’s Homer”
represent the whole. All contain examples.
hands cacophony: bad-
on deck. sounding
metonymy: letting a sounds.
related juxtaposition: stark
object represent sideby-side contrast of
something. two
payment to the crown. different voices,
hyperbole: exaggeration, elements, or
also known as phenomena, as in “After
overstatement. Taught Me.”
litotes: emphasis voice: the personality
through adopted by the poet for
opposite statement. the
Calling a speaking tone of the
fat boy Skinny. poem.
antithesis: balancing or trope: a figure of speech,
contrasting terms. Fair or figurative language.
is Copyright 2006, Royal
foul, and foul is fair. Fireworks Press
apostrophe: addressing www.rfwp.com
someone absent as
though
present. O Captain!
symbol: a word or image
that represents
something
else. The cross.
epithet: a descriptive
name
such as Catherine the
Great,
or the wine-dark sea.
oxymoron: a figure of
speech that combines
opposite
ideas, such as living
death or
sweet sorrow.
allusion: a reference to