Alliteration

The repetition of the same or similar sounds at the beginning of words. Some famous examples of alliteration are tongue twisters such as She sells seashells by the seashore and Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers.

Assonance

The repetition or a pattern of similar sounds, especially vowel sounds, as in the tongue twister "Moses supposes his toeses are roses."

Consonance

The repetition of similar consonant sounds, especially at the ends of words, as in lost and past or confess and dismiss.

Elegy

A poem that laments the death of a person, or one that is simply sad and thoughtful. An example of this type of poem is Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard."

Figure of speech

A verbal expression in which words or sounds are arranged in a particular way to achieve a particular effect. Figures of speech are organized into different categories, such as alliteration, antithesis, assonance, hyperbole, litotes, metaphor, metonymy, onomatopoeia, simile, and synecdoche.

Free verse (also vers libre)

Poetry composed of either rhymed or unrhymed lines that have no set meter.

Haiku

A Japanese poem composed of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables. Haiku often reflect on some aspect of nature.

Limerick

A light, humorous poem of five usually anapestic lines with the rhyme scheme of aabba.

Metaphor

A figure of speech in which two things are compared, usually by saying one thing is another, or by substituting a more descriptive word for the more common or usual word that would be expected. Some examples of metaphors: the world's a stage, he was a lion in battle, drowning in debt, and a sea of troubles.

Meter

The arrangement of a line of poetry by the number of syllables and the rhythm of accented (or stressed) syllables.

Ode

A lyric poem that is serious and thoughtful in tone and has a very precise, formal structure. John Keats's "Ode on a Grecian Urn" is a famous example of this type of poem.

Onomatopoeia

A figure of speech in which words are used to imitate sounds. Examples of onomatopoeic words are buzz, hiss, zing, clippety-clop, cock-a-doodle-do, pop, splat, thump, and tick-tock. Another example of onomatopoeia is found in this line from Tennyson's Come Down, O Maid: "The moan of doves in immemorial elms,/And murmuring of innumerable bees." The repeated "m/n" sounds reinforce the idea of "murmuring" by imitating the hum of insects on a warm summer day.

Personification

A figure of speech in which nonhuman things or abstract ideas are given human attributes: the sky is crying, dead leaves danced in the wind, blind justice.

Quatrain

A stanza or poem of four lines.

Refrain

A phrase, line, or group of lines that is repeated throughout a poem, usually after every stanza.

Rhyme

The occurrence of the same or similar sounds at the end of two or more words. When the rhyme occurs in a final stressed syllable, it is said to be masculine: cat/hat, desire/fire, observe/deserve. When the rhyme occurs in a final unstressed syllable, it is said to be feminine: pleasure/leisure, longing/yearning. The pattern of rhyme in a stanza or poem is shown usually by using a different letter for each final sound. In a poem with an aabba rhyme scheme, the first, second, and fifth lines end in one sound, and the third and fourth lines end in another.

Simile

A figure of speech in which two things are compared using the word "like" or "as." An example of a simile using like occurs in Langston Hughes's poem Harlem: "What happens to a dream deferred?/ Does it dry up/ like a raisin in the sun?"

Stanza

Two or more lines of poetry that together form one of the divisions of a poem. The stanzas of a poem are usually of the same length and follow the same pattern of meter and rhyme.

Tanka

A Japanese poem of five lines, the first and third composed of five syllables and the rest of seven.

Verse

A single metrical line of poetry, or poetry in general (as opposed to prose).