21st Century Literature Handout

Poetic Terms
1. Alliteration—close repetition of consonant sounds, especially initial consonant sounds.
2. Anapest—foot consisting of two unstressed syllables followed by a stress. Third syllable in a line
of a poem is stressed, the former two are not.
3. Assonance—close repetition of vowel sounds. Identical or similar vowel sounds in a series of
words.
4. Blank Verse—consists of two syllables: one unstressed, followed by a stressed one. The pattern
is usually an ‘unstressed-stressed’ type. Just imagine a heartbeat; the stress is on the second beat.
An unrhymed iambic pentameter.
5. Caesura—a deliberate rhetorical or grammatical pause; can be indicated by a tick or a slash.
6. Chapbook—a book consisting of only 25-50 pages.
7. Consonance—quite similar to alliteration and assonance. Consonance focuses on similar
consonant sounds that can be found in either the beginning, middle, or the end.
8. Couplet—a stanza comprised of two lines that rhyme.
9. Dactyl—consists of a stressed syllable followed by two unstressed ones. The opposite of an
anapest.
10. Decasyllable—a line consisting of 10 syllables.
11. Enjambment—lines of poetry from one next to another without using any punctuation, and just
continues.
12. Envoi—brief ending; no more than 4 lines long.
13. Epigraph—a short verse or quote at the beginning.
14. Foot—unit of measure in a metric line of poetry. Anapest and dactyl are examples of this.
15. Galley—first typeset version of a poem, magazine, and/or a book/chapbook.
16. Hendecasyllable—line consisting of 11 syllables.
17. Hexameter—line consisting of 6 metrical feet. Can occur spontaneously.
18. Honorarium—a token of payment for published work.
19. Iamb—consists of an unstressed syllable, followed by a stressed one. Occurs alternatively. This
occurrence can be found in anapest, blank verse, and dactyl.
20. Line—basic unit of a poem.
21. Meter—rhythmic measure of a line.
22. Octave—stanza consisting of 8 lines.
23. Octosyllable—line consisting of 8 syllables.
24. Pentameter—line consisting of 5 metrical feet. An iambic pentameter has 10 syllables (5
unstressed, 5 stressed). The stress on the syllable alternates until it reaches the 10 th syllable.
25. Quatrain—stanza of 4 lines.
26. Quintain—stanza of 5 lines.
27. Refrain—a repeated line in a poem, similar to a song.
28. Rhyme—words that sound alike.
29. Rhythm—the beat and movement (rise and fall, repetition and variation, change of pitch, etc.)
30. Septet—stanza of 7 lines.
31. Sectet—stanza of 6 lines.
32. Spondee—foot consisting of two stressed syllables in the beginning.
33. Stanza—a group of lines that make up a unit.
34. Strophe—used to mean a “stanza”; has irregular line lengths.
35. Tercet—stanza or poem with 3 lines.
36. Tetrameter—line consisting of 4 metrical feet and has 8 syllables.
37. Trochee—foot consisting of a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed one. Has two syllables.