Final Flashcards
Synthesia
An attempt to fuse different senses by describing one kind of sense impression in words normally used to describe another.
Haiku
A Japanese form of poetry consisting of three unrhymed lines of five, seven, and five syllables.
Limerick
A light or humorous form of five chiefly anapestic verses of which lines one, two, and five are three feet and lines three and four are two feet, with a rhyme scheme of aabba.
Pun
Word play in which words with totally different meanings have similar or identical sounds.
ex: Like a firefly in the rain, I’m de-lighted.
Denotation
The dictionary definition of a word.
Hyperbole
An outrageous exaggeration used for effect.
ex: He weighs a ton.
Cacophony
A discordant series of harsh, unpleasant sounds that helps to convey disorder. This is often furthered by the combined effect of the meaning and the difficulty of pronunciation.
ex: My stick fingers click with a snicker, And, chuckling, they knuckle the keys…
Onomatopoeia
Words that sound like their meanings.
ex: boom, buzz, pop, hiss, whir, sizzle
Repitition
The purposeful re-use of words and phrases for an effect.
ex: Half a league, half a league, Half a league onward…
Rhyme
Words that have different beginning sounds but those endings sound alike
ex: time, slime, mime
Tone and mood
The means by which a poet reveals attitudes and feelings, in the style of language or expression of thought used to develop the subject.
Simile
A direct comparison using “like” or “as”
ex: He’s as dumb as an ox
Assonance
Repeated vowel sounds in words placed near each other, usually on the same or adjacent lines. These should be in sounds that are accented or stressed.
ex: He’s a bruisin’ loser.
Metaphor
A direct comparison between two unlike things, stating that one IS the other.
ex: He’s a burro.
Sight rhymes
Words that are spelled the same (as if they rhymed), but are pronounced differently.
ex: enough, cough, bough, through
Rhythm
Verbal stresses in a regular pattern of accented syllables seperated by unaccented syllables. Rhythm helps to distinguish poetry from prose.
ex: i THOUGHT i SAW a PUSsyCAT
Near Rhyme
The final vowel sounds are the same, but the final consonant sounds are slightly different.
ex: poem/goin’
Verse
One single line of a poem arranged in a metrical pattern.
Synecdoche
Indicating a person, object, etc. by letting only a certain part represent a whole.
ex: all hands on deck
Stanza Forms
The names given to describe the number of lines in a stanzaic unit, such as: couplet, tercet, quatrain, quintet, sestet, septet, and octave
Enjambment
The continuation of the logical sense- and therefore the grammatical construction- beyond the end of a line of poetry. This is sometimes done with the title, which in effect becomes the first line of the poem.
Metonymy
A figure of speech in which a person, place, or thing is referred to by something closely associated with it.
ex: The White House stated today that…
The Crown reported…
Allegory
A representation of an abstract or spiritual meaning. Often, it is a symbolic narrative that has not only a literal meaning, but a larger one understood only after reading the entire story or poem.