Poetry is the most misunderstood form of writing.

It is also arguably the

purest form of writing. Poetry is a sense of the beautiful; characterized
by a love of beauty and expressing this through words. It is art. Like art it
is very difficult to define because it is an expression of what the poet
thinks and feels and may take any form the poet chooses for this
expression.

Poetry is not easily defined. Often it

takes the form of verse, but not all
poetry has this structure. Poetry is a
creative use of words which, like all
art, is intended to stir an emotion in
the audience. Poetry generally has
some structure that separates it
from prose.
 Elements of Poetry
• Speaker
• The poem’s speaker is the person who is
addressing the reader. Sometimes, the speaker
is the poet, who addresses the reader directly
or another person. The poet reveals the
identity of the speaker in various ways. Choice
of words, focus of attention and attitudes will
indicate the age, perspective and identity of
the speaker.
 Elements of Poetry
• Content
• Content is the subject of the poem. It answers the
question “what?” What is the poem all about? What
happens in the poem?

• Theme
• The theme of the poem is the meaning of the poem –
the main idea that the poet is trying to communicate.
The theme may be stated directly or it may be implied.
 Rhyme
Links between music and poetry. It adds music
quality to the poem which gives the readers
reading pleasure.
 TYPES OF RHYME
• End Rhymes

Rhyming of the final words of lines in a poem

      Under my window, a clean rasping sound

      When the spade sinks into gravelly ground  
• Internal Rhymes

Rhyming of two words within the same line of

poetry. The following, for example, is from Edgar
Allan Poe’s “The Raven” : 

Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary

Over many a quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore,  
  
• Slant Rhymes (sometimes called imperfect, partial,
near, oblique, off etc.)

Rhyme in which two words share just a vowel sound

(assonance – e.g. “heart” and “star”) or in which
they share just a consonant sound (consonance –
e.g. “milk” and “walk”).
 

 Between my finger and my thumb

      The squat pen rests; snug as a gun  
  
• Rich Rhymes

Rhyme using two different words

 
     Partake the fire divine that burns,
      In Milton, Pope, and Scottish Burns,
      Who sang his native braes and burns.  
  
• Identical Rhymes

Simply using the same word twice.

We paused before a House that seemed

      A Swelling of the Ground—
      The Roof was scarcely visible—
      The Cornice—in the Ground—  
  
 Rhyme Scheme

The organization or pattern of the rhymes at the end of the lines of a

poem. These patterns are usually marked by letters, with the same letter
matching up with words that rhyme.

There was a young man Out my window I can see

Who lived in Shanghai All the cars drive by.
He played kick the can My, I'm up so high
As the cars drove by. I see the top of that tree!
 How to find a rhyme scheme
Rhyme schemes continue through to the end of a poem, no
matter how many lines or stanzas it contains; you usually
do not start over with a new rhyme scheme in each stanza.
When labeling a rhyme scheme in a poem, you can write
uppercase letters at the end of each line that denote
rhymes.
The first line is “A,” and subsequent lines continue through
the alphabet in order.
If you find a line that rhymes with a previous line, you label
it with the same letter as the earlier line.
Remember that a line in the third stanza of a poem could
rhyme with a line in the first stanza.
 Sonnet 18 (Shakespeare)

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 dimm'd;
And every fair from fair sometime declines,
By chance or nature's changing course untrimm'd;
But thy eternal summer shall not fade
Nor lose possession of that fair thou owest;
Nor shall Death brag thou wander'st 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.
When we two parted
In silence and tears,
Half broken-hearted
To sever for years,
Pale grew they cheek and cold,
Colder thy kiss;
The dew of the morning
Sunk Chill on my brow –
It felt like the warning
Of what I feel now.
Thy vows are all broken,
And light is thy fame;
I hear thy name spoken,
And share in its shame.
They name thee before me,
A knell to mine ear;
A shudder comes o'er –
Why wert thou so dear?
They know not I knew thee,
Who knew thee too well: –
Long, long shall I rue thee,
Too deeply to tell.
In secret we met –
In silence I grieve,
That thy heart could forget,
Thy spirit deceive.
If I should meet thee
After long years,
How should I greet thee? –
With silence and tears.
 Form
Refers to the number of lines/verses

- Verse – the line of a poem arranged in a metrical pattern

- Stanza – the unit of poetic lines
Couplet - 2 lines
Tercet - 3 lines
Quatrain - 4 lines
Quintet - 5 lines
Sestet - 6 lines
Septet - 7 lines
Octave - 8 lines