Transcript Elements of Poetry

Elements of Poetry
“POETRY IS WHEN AN EMOTION HAS FOUND
ITS THOUGHT AND THE THOUGHT HAS
FOUND WORDS.”
- ROBERT FROST
Elements of Poetry
 Stanza: lines of a poem grouped into a unit

Example- “Doing Business” by Babs Bell Hajdusiewicz
Stanza 1
My Daddy’s on the phone right now.
He says he’s almost done.
My Daddy’s doing business with
A man from Washington.
Stanza 2
My mother’s doing business, too.
She’s not at home today.
My mother’s doing business at
Her office far away.
Stanza 3
And I’ll be doing business with
Our brand new pooper-scoop,
‘Cause my puppy’s doing business on
Our newly painted stoop!
Elements of Poetry
 Speaker: The voice talking in the poem, not
necessarily the author.

Example – “Annabelle Lee”
(Edgar Allan Poe’s real wife was Virginia Clemm)
Forms of Poetry
• Narrative: A poem that tells a story with plot, setting,
and characters
• Example: The Highwayman by Alfred Noyes
• Sonnet: A poem that has a formal structure of 14 lines
and a specific rhyme scheme
• Example: “Sonnet 43” by William Shakespeare
• Free Verse: A poem without regular patterns of
rhyme and rhythm, capturing the sound of
everyday speech.
• Example “Arithmetic” by Carl Sandburg
Poetic Devices
 Simile: a comparison of two things using “like,” “as,”
or “than”
Anna Nalick – “Breathe”
2 AM and she calls me 'cause I'm still awake,
"Can you help me unravel my latest mistake?,
I don't love him. Winter just wasn't my season"
Yeah we walk through the doors, so accusing their eyes
Like they have any right at all to criticize,
Hypocrites. You're all here for the very same reason
'Cause you can't jump the track, we're like cars on a cable
And life's like an hourglass, glued to the table
No one can find the rewind button, girl.
So cradle your head in your hands
And breathe... just breathe,
Oh breathe, just breathe
Poetic Devices
 Metaphor: a comparison of two things without using
“like” or “as”
“I am a Rock” by Simon & Garfunkel
Gazing from my window to the streets
below
On a freshly fallen silent shroud of snow.
I am a rock,
I am an island.
Poetic Devices
 Alliteration: repetition of the consonant sound at the
beginning of words in a line

Examples:
Peter Piper Picked a Pickled Pepper
 Dr. Seuss’s ABC Book
 The Flea and the Fly

“The Flea and the Fly”
The flea and the fly got caught in the flue.
Said the fly, “Let us Flee.”
Said the Flea, “Let us fly.”
So together they flew through the flaw in
the flue.
Poetic Devices
 Assonance: repetition of the vowel sound throughout
a line of poetry
Into the ink-filled jar she inserted the brush
Poetic Devices
 Onomatopoeia: sound effect word
“Skinny” by Shel Silverstein
Skinny McGuinn
Was so terribly thin
What while taking his bath
Sunday night,
Out popped the plug
And sloosh-swoosh
And glug-glug
It washed Skinny
Right down the drain
Out of sight.
And where is our dear Skinny
Bathing tonight?
In some underground pool
Down below?
Or up there so high
In that tub in the sky
Where all of
The clean people go?
Poetic Devices
 Hyperbole: an exaggeration
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=N_Gjpzi0g
zs
My backpack weighs a ton!
This is taking forever!
Poetic Devices
 Symbolism: when a person, place, object or action
stands for something beyond itself
Doors in the movie Frozen
“We’ll close the gates”
“Don’t let them in. Don’t let them see”
“ Please don’t shut me out again, please
don’t slam the door”
“Tell the guards to open up the gate”
What does a closed door
symbolize? An open
door?
“The window is open, so’s that door”
“Love is an open door”
Poetic Devices
 Imagery: when the author tries to appeal to the
reader using the five senses
“Playing Outfield”
– by Isabel Joshlin Glaser
The baseball drops into your glove,
Sounds like…. Thunk! (Or Plunk?
Or Plop? Whop?) . . . But stays,
Sounds like . . . Another sunny day,
Dust, sweat shivering down,
Clothes plastered to your skin,
THIRST . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
Sounds like you caught a flier,
The other side’s out,
And your team leads,
Everybody’s yelling like crazy,
HOORAY!
water, please . . .
Poetic Devices
 Irony: the contrast between expectation and reality
The Crocodile – by Lewis Carroll
How doth the crocodile,
Improve his shining tail,
And pour the waters of the Nile
On every golden scale!
How cheerfully he seems to grin,
How neatly spread his claws,
And welcomes little fishes in,
With gently smiling jaws!
Poetic Devices
 Pun: a play on the multiple meaning of words
“I Just Can’t Wait to be King
– On The Lion King
[Simba:] I'm gonna be a mighty king
So enemies beware!
[Zazu:] Well, I've never seen a king of beasts
With quite so little hair
[Simba:] I'm gonna be the mane event
Like no king was before
I'm brushing up on looking down
I'm working on my ROAR
[Zazu:] Thus far, a rather uninspiring thing
[Simba:] Oh, I just can't wait to be king!
Poetic Devices
 Personification: when the author gives human
characteristics to non-human objects
 “Song of the Trees”
 “Dear, dear trees…will you ever sing again?”
Poetic Devices
 Tone: the attitude the writer takes on a subject or
character
 Mood: the overall emotion created in the reader.
 https://www.brainpop.com/english/writing/mooda
ndtone
Poetic Devices
 Rhyme: the repetition of sounds in words close
together
“Sick” by Shel Silverstein
"I cannot go to school today"
Internal Said little Peggy Ann McKay.
Rhyme "I have the measles and the mumps,
End
A gash, a rash and purple bumps.
Rhyme
My mouth is wet, my throat is dry.
I'm going blind in my right eye.
My tonsils are as big as rocks,
I've counted sixteen chicken pox.
And there's one more - that's seventeen,
And don't you think my face looks green?
My leg is cut, my eyes are blue,
It might be the instamatic flu.
I cough and sneeze and gasp and choke,
I'm sure that my left leg is broke.
Slant
My hip hurts when I move my chin,
Rhyme
My belly button's caving in.
My back is wrenched, my ankle's sprained,
My 'pendix pains each time it rains.
My toes are cold, my toes are numb,
I have a sliver in my thumb.
My neck is stiff, my voice is weak,
I hardly whisper when I speak.
My tongue is filling up my mouth,
I think my hair is falling out.
My elbow's bent, my spine ain't straight,
My temperature is one-o-eight.
My brain is shrunk, I cannot hear,
There's a hole inside my ear.
I have a hangnail, and my heart is ...
What? What's that? What's that you say?
You say today is .............. Saturday?
G'bye, I'm going out to play!"
Poetic Devices
 Rhythm: the musical quality produced by repeated
sounds
“A Minor Bird” by Robert Frost
I have wished a bird would fly away,
And not sing by my house all day;
Have clapped my hands at him from the door
When it seemed as if I could bear no more.
The fault must partly have been in me
The bird was not to blame for his key
And of course there must be something wrong
In wanting to silence any song.
Poetic Devices
 Rhyme Scheme: a pattern of end rhymes
There once was a man from Peru
Who dreamed he was eating his shoe
He woke with a fright
In the middle of the night
To find that his dream had come true
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GG19g9oiF-w
(A)
(A)
(B)
(B)
(A)
Poetic Devices
 Repetition: when specific words or phrases are
repeated two or more times throughout a poem
Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too
– by Shel Silverstein
Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too
Went for a ride in a flying shoe.
"Hooray!"
"What fun!"
"It's time we flew!"
Said Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too.
Ickle was captain, and Pickle was crew
And Tickle served coffee and mulligan stew
As higher
And higher
And higher they flew,
Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too.
Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too,
Over the sun and beyond the blue.
"Hold on!"
"Stay in!"
"I hope we do!"
Cried Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle Me too.
Ickle Me, Pickle Me, Tickle too
Never returned to the world they knew,
And nobody
Knows what's
Happened to
Dear Ickle Me, Pickle Me,
Tickle Me too.
Poetic Devices
 Allusion: A reference to a statement, person, place or
event (especially from literature, mythology or the
Bible)
 Papa’s shoe store closed after
only a year, and he lost money.
Papa worked hard, but he just
didn’t have the Midas touch.