Study Guide
(glossary – at least ten of these terms should be in the glossary
of your poetry book) - - for the poetry test (know these and be able to apply them)
The test
will have matching, and you will compose two poems where you must
know how to apply figurative language and count syllables.
Allegory
A symbolic narrative in which the surface details imply a secondary meaning
Alliteration
The repetition of consonant sounds, especially at the beginning of words.
Allusion
A reference to a character etc. outside of the story (biblical, mythological, etc.)
Assonance
The repetition of similar vowel sounds in a sentence or a line of poetry or prose, as in
Chorus (Refrain)
Repeated lines (verse) in a song
Free verse
Poetry without a regular pattern of meter or rhyme. The verse is "free" in not being bound by earlier
poetic conventions
Haiku
A Japanese form of 17 syllables
Lyrics
Of the lyre (the words of a song)
Metaphor
A comparison between essentially unlike things without using as like or as
Ode
Usually a serious poem on an exalted subject (praises its subject)
Onomatopoeia
The use of words to imitate the sounds they describe
Paradox
A statement that seems contradictory yet can be true
Personification
The endowment of inanimate objects or abstract concepts with animate or living qualities.
Sestina
A poem of thirty-nine lines and written in iambic pentameter. Its six-line stanza repeat in an intricate
and prescribed order
Shape Poetry
A poem that looks like its subject matter
Simile
A figure of speech involving a comparison between unlike things using like, as
Sonnet
A fourteen-line poem in iambic pentameter. The Shakespearean or English sonnet is arranged as three
quatrains and a final couplet
Stanza
A division or unit of a poem that is repeated in the same form
Symbol
An object or action in a literary work that means more than itself, that stands for something beyond
itself.
Verse
The grouped lines of a song (like a stanza in a poem)
Villanelle
A nineteen-line lyric poem that relies heavily on repetition. The first and third lines alternate