ELEMENTS OF

POETRY
Prepared by Miss Jenny Lou C. Sasoy
Faculty, UE-Caloocan EHSD
POETRY
• It is the art of expressing oneself in verse.
• It uses few words to convey its message.
• It is meant to be read aloud.
• It uses imagery or figures of speech to express feelings or create a mental picture or idea.
 "Chartless“
Lines Emily Dickinson

1 I never saw a moor,

2 I never saw the sea,
• A single line in a
3 Yet I know how the heather looks
poem.
4 and what a wave must be.
• Often organized into
stanzas. 5 I never spoke with God,
6 nor visited in Heaven,
7 Yet I am certain of the spot
8 as if the chart were given.

This poem has 8 lines

organized into 2 stanzas.
 “First and Last”
STANZA by David McCord

A tadpole hasn’t a pole at all,

• It is the group of And he doesn’t live in a hole in the wall.
lines.
You’ve got it wrong: a polecat’s not
• Couplet – 2 lines A cat on a pole. And I’ll tell you what:
• Triplet – 3 lines
• Quatrain – 4 lines A bullfrog’s never a bull; and how
Could a cowbird possibly be a cow?
• Quinrain – 5 lines
• Sestet – 6 lines A kingbird, though, is a kind of king,
• Octet – 8 lines And he chases a crow like anything.

• It develops and
Four Stanzas in COUPLETS.
emphasizes one idea.
RHYME AND RHYME SCHEME
• Words rhyme if they
sound alike.
• Poems often use
rhymes at the end of
lines.
• Rhyme scheme is the
pattern of rhymes in
a poem.
• Poets use rhymes to
add a musical sound
to their poems.
TYPES OF RHYME
ALLITERATION – repetition of the initial consonant
sound.
 She sells sea shells by the sea shore.
CONSONANCE – repetition of the intermediate or final
consonant sound.
• Tick tock, flip flop, singing longing
ASSONANCE – repetition of vowel sound.
• Hear the mellow wedding bells,
Golden bells!
What a world of happiness their harmony foretells!
RHYTHM
• Pattern of beats or a series of stressed and
unstressed syllables in poem.
• Poets create rhythm by using words in which
parts are emphasized or not emphasized.
“Windy Nights”
By Robert Louis Stevenson
Whenever the moon and stars are set,
Whenever the wind is high,
All night long in the dark and wet,
A man goes riding by.
Late in the night when the fires are out,
Why does he gallop and gallop about?
METER
• It is the measure of a line in a poetry.

FOOT
• It is the grouping of two or more syllables making up a basic
unit of meter.
TYPES OF METRICAL FOOT
• IAMBIC foot consists of unaccented syllable followed by an
accented. It can be heard in such words as "because, hello, Elaine".
• TROCHAIC foot consists of an accented syllable followed by an
unaccented. These are trochaic words: answer, Tuesday, Albert.
• DACTYLIC foot consists of an accented syllable followed by two
unaccented syllables. You can hear the dactylic beat in these words:
beautiful, silently, Saturday.
• ANAPESTIC foot consists of two unaccented syllables followed by an
accented syllable. These words are anapestic: cavalier, tambourine,
Marianne.
• SPONDAIC foot consists of two accented syllables.
• PYRRHIC foot consists of two unaccented syllables.
 “Poor”
MOOD by Myra Livingston
I heard of poor. Short words and
• The feeling that a poem
It means hungry, no food. lines create a
creates in a reader.
No shoes, no place to live, serious mood.
• It can be positive or
negative. Nothing good.
• Mood can be made with
the length of the It means winter nights
sentences, chosen And being cold, These words create
words, and word It is lonely, alone. the feeling of
sounds. sadness.
Feeling old.

Poor is a tired face.

Poor is thin.
Poor is standing outside
Looking in.
TONE
• It is the attitude a writer takes towards the
subject or audience of the poem.

“The Crocodile” The subject of the poem

How doth the little crocodile are crocodiles. The
Improve his shining tail, writers attitude towards
And pour the water of the Nile crocodiles is that they
On every golden scale! are dangerous.
How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spreads his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in
With gently smiling jaws!
IMAGERY “There is a Thing”
by Jack Prelutsky
There is a thing
• Language that beneath the stair These are
appeals to the 5 image words
senses. with slimy face
• Are “word and oily hair
pictures”. that does not move
• Helps the reader to or speak or sing
experience familiar
things in a fresh or do another
way using the single thing
senses.
but sit and wait
beneath the stair
with slimy face
and oily hair.
FIGURES OF SPEECH
• A mode of expression in which words are used
out of their literal meaning or out of their
ordinary use in order to add beauty or
emotional intensity or to transfer the poet's
sense impressions by comparing or identifying
one thing with another that has a meaning
familiar to the reader.
SIMILE
• A figure of speech in which two fundamentally
unlike things are explicitly compared, usually in a
phrase introduced by like or as.
• "Good coffee is like friendship: rich and warm and strong."
(slogan of Pan-American Coffee Bureau)

• "You know life, life is rather like opening a tin of sardines. We're all
of us looking for the key."
(Alan Bennett, Beyond the Fringe, 1960)

• "When Lee Mellon finished the apple he smacked his lips together
like a pair of cymbals."
(Richard Brautigan, A Confederate General From Big Sur, 1964)
METAPHOR
• A figure of speech in which an implied comparison
is made between two unlike things that actually
have something in common.

• "Between the lower east side tenements

the sky is a snotty handkerchief."
(Marge Piercy, "The Butt of Winter")
•

"The streets were a furnace, the sun an executioner."

(Cynthia Ozick, "Rosa")
PERSONIFICATION
• A figure of speech in which an inanimate object
or abstraction is given human qualities or
abilities.

The wind stood up and gave a shout.

He whistled on his fingers and

Kicked the withered leaves about

And thumped the branches with his hand

And said he'd kill and kill and kill,

And so he will! And so he will!
(James Stephens, "The Wind")
ONOMATOPOEIA
• The use of words that imitate the sounds
associated with the objects or actions they refer
to.
• "Chug, chug, chug. Puff, puff, puff. Ding-dong, ding-
dong. The little train rumbled over the tracks."
("Watty Piper" [Arnold Munk], The Little Engine That Could)
• "Brrrrrrriiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiiinng! An alarm clock clanged in the dark
and silent room."
(Richard Wright, Native Son, 1940)
• "I'm getting married in the morning!
Ding dong! the bells are gonna chime."
(Lerner and Loewe, "Get Me to the Church on Time," My
Fair Lady)
HYPERBOLE
• A figure of speech in which exaggeration is used
for emphasis or effect; an extravagant
statement.

• “I had to walk 15 miles to school in the snow, uphill”

• “you could have knocked me over with a feather”