Poetic Terms Flashcards
Allegory
A symbolic narrative
Alliteration
Repetition of consonant sounds. “Fetched fresh, as I suppose, off some sweet wood.”
Ballad
Four-line stanzas, contains couplets
Blank Verse
A line of poetry or prose in unrhymed iambic pentameter (5 syllable unstressed/stressed words).
Caesura
A strong pause within a line of verse. Often using a “-“.
Connotation
Associations called up by a word that goes beyond its dictionary meaning.
Convention
A customary feature of a literary work, such as the use of a chorus in Greek tragedy.
Couplet
A pair of rhymed lines. “For thy sweet love remembered such wealth brings / That then I scorn to change my state with kings “
Diction
The selection of words in a literary work.
Enjambment
A run-on line of poetry in which logical and grammatical sense carries over from one line into the next.
Foot
A metrical unit of stressed and unstressed syllables.
Free Verse
Poetry without a regular pattern of meter or rhyme.
Hyperbole
A figure of speech involving deep exaggeration.
Iamb
An unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one.
Irony
A contrast or discrepancy between what is said and what is meant.
