Poetry Terms Flashcards
(25 cards)
Poetic form
Various sets of rules followed by poems of certain types, may describe aspects like rhythm, rhyme scheme, alliteration
Elegy
Melancholic poem that laments its subject’s death, but ends on consolation
Free verse
Non metrical, non rhyming lines that closely follow natural rhythms of speech
Lament
Any poem expressing deep grief
Ode
Formal lyric poem that addresses and celebrates a noun
Panegyric
Poem of effusive praise, like eulogy and ode
Sonnet
Thoughtful, meditative, religious, romantic song, 14 line poem
Meter
Rhythmical pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables in verse
Blank verse
Poetry written in unrhymed iambic pentameter
Heroic couplet
Rhyming pair of lines in iambic pentameter
Caesura
Stop or pause in metrical line, often marked by punctuation
Enjambment
Running over of a sentence or phrase from one poetic line to the next without terminal punctuation
End stop
Metrical line ending at grammatical boundary or break
Alliteration
Repetition of initial stressed consonant sounds in series of words within a phrase or verse line
Sibilance
Speech having hissing effect, use of s or soft c
Onomatopoeia
Sound of a word imitates its sense
Assonance
Repetition of vowel sounds without repeating consonants
Dissonance
Disruption of harmonic sounds of rhythms, harsh collection of sounds, (k, g hard c)
Consonance
Repetition of same consonant in short succession
Synesthesia
Blending of different sense modalities (eg seeing color when hearing sounds)
Elegy (elegiac)
Poem that laments the death of a person, or is sad and thoughtful
Couplet
Pair of lines that are same length, rhymes and forms a complete thought
Quatrain
Stanza of poem of four lines
Cacophony
Series of harsh sounds to convey disorder
