Poetry

Common Elements of the Genre

1) Lines and Stanzas

Lines

The poetic line begins on the left side of the page and ends where the poet decides to "break" or wrap the line. Whether the lines of a poem are long or short, in traditional meter or in free verse, there should be some logic or intuition governing the placement of a line break.
Because the last word of a poetic line -- just before the white space -- typically receives the most emphasis, poets delight in finding ways to exploit the line break.
end-stop: a line that ends with any sort of punctuation ( a period, semicolon, comma, or dash)enjambment: breaking a line at a mark of punctuation is to wrap it in the middle of a sentence.

Stanza

Stanzas are a group of lines in a poem, the equivalent of paragraphs in prose.
Common forms of stanzas
  • Couplet - two lines of verse that are connected in some way
  • Tercet - a group of three lines
  • Quatrain - a group of four lines in poetry
  • Quintet - five lines
  • Sestet - six lines
  • Septet - seven lines
  • Octet - eight lines


2) Meter and Rhythm

Meter is the arrangement of words in a poem based on the relative stress of their syllables. If you have written rhyming poems before, you probably composed in meter, even if you didn't realize it at the time. That da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM, da-DUM you were hearing in your head is actually called iambic tetrameter. Simply put, Rhythm is the sound of an actual line while meter is the abstract pattern behind the rhythm.
In math, individuals use inches and meters to measure objects and lengths. In poetry, the unit of measurement is a foot (or one stressed and one/two unstressed syllables).

Common types of poetic feet
  • iamb (iambic): _ / [The most common type]
  • trochee (trochaic): / _
  • anapest (anapestic): _ _ /
  • dactyl (dactylic): /_ _
  • spondee (spondaic): / /
  • pyrrhic (pyrrhic): _ _


Length of lines
  • monometer: one foot per line
  • dimeter: two feet
  • trimeter: three feet
  • tetrameter: four feet
  • pentameter: five feet
  • hexameter: six feet
  • helptameter: seven feet
  • octameter: eight feet


Free verse - a poem without rhyme or a regular rhythm

3) The Music of Poetry

Ideally, in a poem, phrases of words are like phrases of music; poets reading from their work are like musicians interpreting the notes on a page. To achieve this music in their poetry, poets use a range of devices.
  • rhyme - a correspondence of sound in two or more words
  • alliteration - repetition of initial consonant sounds (or consonant sounds at the beginning of words)
  • consonance - repetition of recurring consonant sounds (anywhere in the word)
  • assonance - repetition of internal vowel sounds in words that do not end the same

4) Images, Symbols, and Figurative Language

Show, don't tell. Whether your creative writing class is being taught in Maine or Missouri or Manitoba, you will hear this piece of advice repeatedly. One of the primary ways of doing this is using figurative language (Link to list of figurative language).
Style in poetry usually refers to the author's selection and placement of words in a line, lines in a stanza, and stanzas in a poem.
Pun - a play on the multiple meanings of a word or its relation to other words that sound like itIrony - when things appear the way they actually are (verbal irony: when someone says one thing but means another; situational irony: the results of a situation are distinctly different from what is expected)

5) Poetic Forms (that aren't free verse)

Rondelet - 7 lines1 Four syllables (A)2 Eight syllables (b)3 Repeat line 1 (A)4 Eight syllables (a)5 Eight syllables (b)6 Eight syllables (b)7 Repeat line 1
Triolet - 8 lines1 (A)2 (B)3 (a)4 (A) Repeat line 15 (a)6 (b)7 (A) Repeat line 18 (B) Repeat line 2
Cinquain - 5 lines1 two syllables2 four syllables3 six syllables4 eight syllables5 two syllables
Terza rima - The end-word of the second line in one tercet supplies the rhyme for the first and third lines in the following tercet. Thus, the rhyme scheme (aba, bcb, cdc, ded) continues through to the final stanza or line.
Link to an example of this form

Cento - At its most basic level, the cento is a poem comprised of lines and phrases from other previously written poems. Many centos (including my example below) use the work of multiple poets. But there are some that focus on just one specific poet.
Link for helping create Cento poems.


Pantoum - Each quatrain of a pantoum follows an ABAB rhyme scheme with lines that are eight to twelve syllables long. The second and fourth lines of the first stanza become first and third lines of the next stanza. This pattern continues until the final stanza, in which the last line is usually the same as the first line of the poem. See the example below.
"Cycling in the Summertime"Cycling in the summertime is swellThe feel of the cool wind in your faceRiding through a level flowering dell,Exhilaration finally winning the race.
The feel of the cool wind in your faceSweet scents of blossoms inhaling,Exhilaration finally winning the raceWith tired and sore muscles entailing.
Sweet scents of blossoms inhalingThe sun feeling warm on your face,With tired and sore muscles entailingYou accept your trophy with grace.
The sun feeling warm on your faceCongratulations on the victory won,You accept your trophy with grace The whole experience so much fun.
Congratulations on the victory wonRiding through a level flowering dell,The whole experience so much funCycling in the summertime is swell.

Questions to Consider - Content Checklist

Lines and Stanzas

  1. Do your line endings make sense?

2. If your lines are grouped into stanzas, do the groupings make sense?

Meter and Rhythm

1.If your poem is written in meter, have you scanned the meter to make sure it's doing what you want it to do?

2. If you're not writing in meter, does your poem still have a discernible rhythm?

The Music of Poetry

1. Does your rhyming poem need to rhyme or be better as free verse?

2. Do you hear the "music" in your poetry?

Images, Symbols, and Figurative Language

1. Have you eliminated all the cliches from your poem?

2. Do you use metaphors, similes and other figurative language to good effect?

Poetic Forms

1. Do you understand all the rules of the form in which you are working?

Fixing Your Writing

Revising and Editing

Revise - making major changes to a document's content, structure, and/or organization

Edit - making sentence-level changes such as grammar and usage