Lesson 4: Elements of Poetry

• Stanzas are the poetic equivalent of a prose paragraph, consisting of a series of lines grouped together and separated from other groups by a skipped line
• Stanzas come in various lengths, depending on the poet's preference or the conventions of a specific poetic form
• Common technical vocabulary for stanzas of specific lengths:

  • 2 lines: couplet
  • 3 lines: tercet
  • 4 lines: quatrain
  • 5 lines: cinquain
  • 6 lines: sestet or occasionally a sexain
  • 7 lines: septet
  • 8 lines: octave
• Lyric poetry focuses on the emotional life of the poet, written in their voice and expressing strong thoughts and emotions
• Narrative poetry is concerned with storytelling, following plot conventions like conflict, rising action, climax, and resolution
• Descriptive poetry uses rich imagery to describe the world around the poet, focusing more on externalities rather than the poet's interior life
• Sonnets are predominantly about matters of the heart, with two common forms: Shakespearean and Petrarchan, both consisting of 14 lines
• Haikus are disciplined poems with origins in 17th-century Japanese poetry, often focusing on nature and natural phenomena, written in three-line stanzas with specific syllable counts per line
• Elegies are poems of lamentation reflecting on death or someone who has died, usually expressed in three parts: grief, praise for the deceased, and consolation
• Limericks are humorous poems with a distinct verbal rhythm, consisting of 5 lines with specific syllable counts and a closing punchline
• Ballads are narrative poems often romantic, adventurous, or humorous, arranged in quatrains with alternating 4 and 3 beat lines and a specific rhyme scheme
• Odes are lyrical poems that address and often praise a person, thing, or event, usually with a solemn and serious tone, exploring universal elements of the theme
• Epics are long narrative poems recounting heroic tales, written in an elevated style and grand in scale
• Sound Devices in poetry include alliteration, assonance, consonance, onomatopoeia, rhyme, and rhythm
• Figurative Language in poetry includes metaphor, personification, and simile