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 foot | a rhythmic unit of usually two or three syllables with one being stressed |
| iamb | a pair of syllables with the first less stressed than the second |
| stress | the emphasis placed on a syllable |
| duration | shortness or length of a syllable when pronounced relative to the syllables surrounding it |
| line | the characters that appear on a single line regardless of grammatical structure |
| syntax | the words in their arrangement, and the dynamic energy the arrangement creates |
| syntactical unit | a sentence, phrase, or clause |
| enjambment | a run-over line |
| trochee | a pair of syllables with the first more prominent than the second |
| anapest | a group of three syllables, with the first two unstressed and the third stressed |
| spondee | a foot of stressed syllables |
| caesura | a pause in a line often indicated by punctuation |
| stanza | a grouped set of lines in a poem, usually physically set off from other such clusters by an extra line of space |
| couplet | two successive lines, usually in the same meter, linked by rhyme |
| tercet | a three line stanza |
| quatrain | a four line stanza |
| sestet | a six line stanza |
| assonance | repetition at close intervals of the vowel sounds of accented syllables or important words: hat-ran-amber, vein-made |
| consonance | repetition at close intervals of the final consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words: book-plaque-thicker |
| alliteration | repetition at close intervals of the initial consonant sounds of accented syllables or important words: map-moon, kill-code, preach-approve |
| cacophony | a harsh, discordant, unpleasant-sounding choice and arrangement of sounds |
| euphony | a smooth, pleasant-sounding choice and arrangement of sounds |
| allusion | a brief reference to a person, place, thing, event, or idea in history or literature |
| antithesis | the juxtaposition of contrasting ideas, often in parallel structure |
| apostrophe | a figure of speech in which someone absent or dead or something nonhuman is addressed as if it were alive and present and could reply |
| hyperbole | the use of exaggerated terms for the purpose of emphasis or heightened effect |
| image | a short, vivid description that creates a strong sensory impression |
| imagery | the representation through language of sense experience |
| litotes | deliberate use of understatement |
| metaphor | implied comparison between two things of unlike nature |
| metonymy | substitution of some attributive or suggestive word for what is actually meant |
| onomatopoeia | the use of words that supposedly mimic their meaning in their sound: boom, click, pop, buzz |
| paradox | a statement that initially appears to be contradictory but then, on closer inspection, turns out to make sense |
| parallelism | similarity of structure in a pair or series of related words, phrases, or clauses |
| personification | investing abstractions or inanimate objects with human qualities |
| simile | explicit comparison between two things of unlike nature |
| synecdoche | figure of speech in which a part stands for the whole |
| trope | one of the two major divisions of figures of speech (the other being rhetorical figures) which refers to the figurative turning or twisting of some word or phrase to make it mean something else. |