Poetry Vocabulary
assonance
Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds with
nonrhyming words. An example of assonance is the
repetition of the i sound in the following line: Into the
ink-filled jar she inserted the brush.
couplet
A couplet is a rhymed pair of lines. A couplet may be
written in any rhythmic pattern: Follow your heart’s
desire/And good things may transpire.
free verse
Poetry without regular patterns of rhyme and rhythm is
called free verse. Some poets use free verse to capture
the sounds and rhythms of ordinary speech.
lyric poem
Lyric poetry is poetry that presents the personal thoughts
and feelings of a single speaker. Most poems, other than
narrative poems, are lyric poems. Lyric poetry can be in
a variety of forms and cover many subjects, from love
and death to everyday experiences.
meter
In poetry, meter is the regular pattern of stressed ( ) and
unstressed ( ) syllables. Although poems have rhythm,
not all poems have regular meter. Each unit of meter is
known as a foot and is made up of one stressed syllable
and one or two unstressed syllables.
ode
Ode is a type of lyric poem that deals with serious
themes, such as justice, truth or beauty.
refrain
A refrain is one or more lines repeated in each stanza of a
poem.
repetition
Repetition is a technique in which a sound, word, phrase,
or line is repeated for emphasis or unity. Repetition
helps to reinforce meaning and create an appealing
rhythm.
rhyme
Rhyme is the repetition of sounds at the end of words.
Words rhyme when their accented vowels and the letters
that follow have identical sounds. Cat and hat rhyme, as
do feather, and leather. The most common type of
rhyme in poetry is called end rhyme, in which rhyming
words come at the end of lines. Rhyme that occurs
within a line of poetry is called internal rhyme.