| Term | Definition |
|---|
| ode | a lyric poem typically of elaborate or irregular metrical form and expressive of exalted or enthusiastic emotion. |
| lyric | having the form and musical quality of a song, and esp. the character of a songlike outpouring of the poet's own thoughts and feelings, as distinguished from epic and dramatic poetry. |
| dramatic | highly effective; striking |
| elegy | a mournful, melancholy, or plaintive poem, esp. a funeral song or a lament for the dead. |
| narrative | a story or account of events, experiences, or the like, whether true or fictitious. |
| pastoral | portraying or suggesting idyllically the life of shepherds or of the country, as a work of literature, |
| monologue | any composition in which a single person speaks alone. |
| ballad | a simple narrative poem of folk origin, composed in short stanzas and adapted for singing. |
| sonnet | Prosody. a poem, properly expressive of a single, complete thought, idea, or sentiment, of 14 lines, usually in iambic pentameter, with rhymes arranged according to one of certain definite schemes, being in the strict or Italian form divided into a major group of 8 lines (the octave) followed by a minor group of 6 lines (the sestet), and in a common English form into 3 quatrains followed by a couplet. |
| epic | noting or pertaining to a long poetic composition, usually centered upon a hero, in which a series of great achievements or events is narrated in elevated style: |
| valediction | an utterance, oration, or the like, given in bidding farewell or taking leave; valedictory. |
| trochee | a foot of two syllables, a long followed by a short in quantitative meter, or a stressed followed by an unstressed in accentual meter. |
| anapest | a foot of three syllables, two short followed by one long in quantitative meter, and two unstressed followed by one stressed in accentual meter, as in for the nonce. |
| assonance | resemblance of sounds. |
| alliteration | the commencement of two or more stressed syllables of a word group either with the same consonant sound or sound group (consonantal alliteration) or with a vowel sound that may differ from syllable to syllable (vocalic alliteration), |
| cacophony | harsh discordance of sound; dissonance: |
| heroic couplet | a stanza consisting of two rhyming lines in iambic pentameter, esp. one forming a rhetorical unit and written in an elevated style |
| blank verse | unrhymed verse, esp. the unrhymed iambic pentameter most frequently used in English dramatic, epic, and reflective verse. |
| caesura | any break, pause, or interruption. |
| scansion | the metrical analysis of verse. The usual marks for scansion are ˘ for a short or unaccented syllable, ¯ or ʹ for a long or accented syllable, ^ for a rest, | for a foot division, and ‖ for a caesura or pause. |
| iamb | a foot of two syllables, a short followed by a long in quantitative meter, or an unstressed followed by a stressed in accentual meter, as in Come live / with me / and be / my love. |
| dactyl | a foot of three syllables, one long followed by two short in quantitative meter, or one stressed followed by two unstressed in accentual meter, as in gently and humanly. |
| spondee | a foot of two syllables, both of which are long in quantitative meter or stressed in accentual meter. |
| consonance | the correspondence of consonants, esp. those at the end of a word, in a passage of prose or verse. or the use of the repetition of consonants or consonant patterns as a rhyming device. |
| onomatopoeia | the formation of a word, as cuckoo or boom, by imitation of a sound made by or associated with its referent. |
| euphony | agreeableness of sound; pleasing effect to the ear, esp. a pleasant sounding or harmonious combination or succession of words |
| prosody | the science or study of poetic meters and versification. |
| free verse | verse that does not follow a fixed metrical pattern. |
| masculine rhyme | a rhyme of but a single stressed syllable, as in disdain, complain. |
| feminine rhyme | a rhyme either of two syllables of which the second is unstressed (double rhyme), as in motion, notion, or of three syllables of which the second and third are unstressed (triple rhyme), as in fortunate, importunate. |
| apostrophe | a digression in the form of an address to someone not present, or to a personified object or idea, as "O Death, where is thy sting?" |
| hyperbole | obvious and intentional exaggeration. |
| metaphor | a figure of speech in which a term or phrase is applied to something to which it is not literally applicable in order to suggest a resemblance, as in "A mighty fortress is our God." |
| synecdoche | a figure of speech in which a part is used for the whole or the whole for a part, the special for the general or the general for the special, as in ten sail for ten ships or a Croesus for a rich man. |
| paradox | a statement or proposition that seems self-contradictory or absurd but in reality expresses a possible truth. |
| ambiguity | an unclear, indefinite, or equivocal word, expression, meaning, etc. |
| conceit | an elaborate, fanciful metaphor, esp. of a strained or far-fetched nature. |
| simile | a figure of speech in which two unlike things are explicitly compared, as in "she is like a rose." |
| metonymy | a figure of speech that consists of the use of the name of one object or concept for that of another to which it is related, or of which it is a part, as "scepter" for "sovereignty," or "the bottle" for "strong drink," or "count heads (or noses)" for "count people." |
| oxymoron | a figure of speech by which a locution produces an incongruous, seemingly self-contradictory effect, as in "cruel kindness" or "to make haste slowly." |
| personification | the attribution of a personal nature or character to inanimate objects or abstract notions, esp. as a rhetorical figure. |
| cinquain | a short poem consisting of five, usually unrhymed lines containing, respectively, two, four, six, eight, and two syllables. |
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