PoeticForms

Acrostic Poem An acrostic poem takes a word and makes each letter the first line of a poem. The words do not have to rhyme.

An acrostic poem Can be about anything, Really.   Of course, some people like to Start each line as a sentence, Though I prefer weaving words into a  Creation that is more freeform.

Here’s another acrostic poem:

 HockeyHockey is my favorite sportOn the ice or streetCool and funKeep on playingExercise and strongerYou should try it!

Haiku 

Haiku poems have 3 lines that don’t rhyme; they often have a nature theme.  Each line must have a certain number of syllables:

1st line:  5 syllables2nd line:  7 syllables3rd line:  5 syllables  

 

                                                               The RoseThe red blossom bendsand drips its dew to the ground.Like a tear it falls

Here’s another haiku poem.

The PondAn old silent pond . . .A frog jumps into the pond,Splash!  Silence again.

Limericks Lines 1, 2, and 5 have seven to ten syllables and rhyme with one another. Lines 3 and 4  have five to seven syllables and also rhyme with each other.

There was an Old Man with a beard,Who said, 'It is just as I feared!Two Owls and a Hen,Four Larks and a Wren,Have all built their nests in my beard!

Another limerick . . .

There once was a turkey named Chummy,My mom thought he might be quite yummy.

He waddled awayOn Thanksgiving Day 

But still ended up in my tummy! 

Shape Poems

Another shape poem . . .

PoeticDevices 

Examples of Hyperbole:

I'm so hungry I could eat a whole cow!

My backpack weighs a ton!

Can you think of some others?

Find the examples of hyperbole in this poem:

The Christmas TreeMomma bought a tree bigger than Jack’s giant.The branches were so longThey gave each other huge bear hugs.It took a million lightsTo even make the tree seem half awakeAnd a thousand gifts to sootheThe giant’s appetite.

OnomatopoeiaOnomatopoeia is the use of words that sound like the noises they describe.           Ex:  zing, poof, whack, plop, click, thud

Galoshes     Susie’s galoshes     Make splishes and sploshes     And sloshes and sloshes     As Susie steps slowly     Along in the slush.

 

Personification

Personification is a type of figurative language in which writers give an animal, object or idea human qualities, such as the ability to hear, feel, and talk.

EX:  The trash can gobbled their papers.

Examples of Personification:

From Lonesome Dove by Larry McMurtry The wind howled across the flat plain, and the sand seemed to sing as it skimmed the ground.  

RepetitionRepetition means “to repeat” something. It is the use of any element of language – a sound, word,

phrase or sentence – more than once.

From Lincoln’s Gettysburg Address: “. . . this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom – and that government of the people, by the people, for the people, shall not perish from this earth.”

Internal RhymeWords within a line of poetry rhyme with each other.

From “The Raven” by Edgar Allan Poe Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered, weak and weary

Also from “The Raven” . . .

Over many quaint and curious volume of forgotten lore – While I nodded, nearly napping, suddenly there came a tappingAs of some one gently rapping, rapping at my chamber door“ ‘Tis some visitor,” I muttered, “tapping at my chamber door --”

Extended Metaphor

The writer of a poem or prose continues throughout the poem or literary work.

EX: (As you already know!)In the poem “O Captain! My Captain!” Walt Whitman compares Abraham Lincoln to the captain of a ship. The ship represents the United States.

Another example of an extended metaphor can be found in Little Bee by Chris Cleave: 

The flatscreen was showing BBC News 24 with the sound down. They were running a segment on the war. Smoke was rising above one of the countries involved. Don’t ask me which – I’d lost track by that stage. The war was four years old. It had started in the same month my son was born, and they’d grown up together. At first, both of them were a huge shock and demanded constant attention, but as each year went by, they became more autonomous and one could start to take one’s eye off them for extended periods. Sometimes a particular event would cause me momentarily to look at one or the other of them – my son, or the war – and at times like these I would always think, Gosh, haven’t you grown?

You may rest your brain 

now!