alliteration
the repetition of beginning consonant sounds (sally sold seashells)
allusion
a reference to a mythological, literary, or historical person, place, or thing (patience of job [bible])
apostrophe
talking to the absent or dead as if present and the inanimate as if animate (romeo and juliet when romeo wasn't actually dead)
assonance
the repetition of internal vowel sounds in a series of words (cAt's bAck)
blank verse
a verse form that is unrhymed iambic pentameter
consonance
the repetition of an internal consonant sound with a series of words (little bitty kitty)
diction
word choice
free verse
a verse form that has no set rhyme and no set rhythem
fixed form
poem structure with a regular pattern of number and length of lines in stanzas (4 lines, 4 lines, 4 lines)
hyperbole
a deliberate, extravagant, and often outrageous exaggeration (used for serious or comic effect)
imagery
Description that appeals to the senses (sight, sound, smell, touch, taste)
metaphor
an implied comparison or explicit comparison of two unlike things (she is a snake)
meter
the patterns of stressed and unstressed syllables that create a set rhythm; named by pattern and number of them in one like: iambic pentameter= five sets of unstressed/stressed syllables
Onomatopoeia
the use of words in which seem to resemble the sounds they describe
Oxymoron
a pair of contrary terms combined into a single expression. The combination usually serves the purpose of shocking the reader into awareness
paradox
a statement that appears to be contradictory but on inspection turns out to be true or at least to make sense
Personification
giving inanimate objects or abstract ideas human characteristics
rhyme
similarity of sounds, usually at the end of lines
perfect ryhme
identical sounds
slant rhyme
sounds that are close but not identical
eye ryhme
words that look as if they sounds alike
rhyme scheme
the rhyming pattern found in a poem
Sonnet
a fixed form of fourteen lines of iambic pentameter
Similie
A comparison using "like" or "as
Symbolism
the use of one object which stands for something else
Understatement
it is a kind of irony that deliberately represents something as being much less than it really is
verbal irony
what is said is not what is meant
couplet
two lines
heroic couplet
two rhyming lines in iambic pentameter
tercet
three lines
quatrain
four lines
quintet
five lines
sestet
six lines
octave
eight lines
foot
a unit of meter
iamb (iambic)
2 syllables (unstressed, stressed)
anapest (anapestic)
3 syllables (unstressed, unstressed, stressed)
Trochee (trochaic)
2 syllables (stressed unstressed)
dactyl (dactylic)
3 syllables (stressed, unstressed, unstressed)
spondee (spondaic)
2 syllables (stressed, stressed)