Poetry Terms

Question 1

Elegy

Answer 1

Poem mourning the dead.

Question 2

Epigram

Answer 2

Short, pointed poem.

Question 3

Epitaph

Answer 3

An inscription on a gravestone.

Question 4

Epithalamion

Answer 4

A poem celebrating a wedding.

Question 5

Nocturne

Answer 5

A night scene.

Question 6

Pastoral

Answer 6

A poem spoken by a shepherd, loosely in the countryside.

Question 7

Valediction

Answer 7

A goodbye.

Question 8

Reproach

Answer 8

Address in a way to express disapproval.

Question 9

Lament

Answer 9

An expression of grief or sorrow.

Question 10

Invocation

Answer 10

Asking a deity to be present among humans.

Question 11

Prosody

Answer 11

The measure in which poetry is written (counted lines in units called feet)

Question 12

Iambic

Answer 12

Unstressed, stressed metrical scheme.

Question 13

Anapestic

Answer 13

2unstressed,stressed scheme

Question 14

Trochaic

Answer 14

Stressed,unstressed scheme

Question 15

Dactylic

Answer 15

Stressed,2 unstressed scheme

Question 16

Spondaic

Answer 16

Stressed,stressed scheme

Question 17

Pyrrhic

Answer 17

2unstressed scheme

Question 18

Heroic couplet

Answer 18

Iambic pentameter couplet that is end stopped

Question 19

Terza Rima

Answer 19

Pentameter tercet with interlinked rhymes.

Question 20

Rime royal

Answer 20

7 line stanza in iambic pentameter.

Question 21

Ottava Rima

Answer 21

8 line iambic pentameter.

Question 22

Spenserian stanza

Answer 22

9 line form in iambic pentameter.

Question 23

Sonnet

Answer 23

14 line poem.

Question 24

Shakespearean sonnet

Answer 24

Consists of 3 quatrains and a couplet.

Question 25

Spenserian sonnet

Answer 25

Same form as Shakespearean, but interlocking rhyme scheme.

Question 26

Sestina

Answer 26

A pentameter poem consisting of 6 stanzas of 6 lines with repeated end words plus a 3 line coda.

Question 27

Villanelle

Answer 27

A poem of 5 pentameter tercets rhyming aba, followed by a quatrain rhyming abaa.

Question 28

Ode

Answer 28

Has no set form, defined by its content (exalted tone, lofty or sublime).

Question 29

Agency

Answer 29

The subject is the agency of the verb.

Question 30

Emjambent

Answer 30

Continuation of a sentence without a pause beyond the end of a line.

Question 31

Alliteration

Answer 31

Same letter or sound

Question 32

Allegory

Answer 32

A poem that delivers a moral meaning.

Question 33

Acrostic

Answer 33

A poem, where parts of it form words.

Question 34

Ars poetica

Answer 34

A poem where Horace advises poets on the art of writing poetry.

Question 35

Aubade

Answer 35

A dawn poem in which 1 of lovers is waked by the sun and speaks.