Poetry Terms

A concrete object used to represent an idea

A figure of speech that compares two things using like or as

A figure of speech in which a nonhuman thing is given human characteristics

A true statement that says two opposite things

Connecting two words with opposite meanings

A figure of speech that compares two things without using the words like or as

Exaggeration used to emphasize a point

A metric line of poetry. It is named according to the kind and number of feet composing it: iambic pentameter, for example

• Monometer: One Foot
• Dimeter: Two Feet
• Trimeter: Three Feet
• Tetrameter: Four Feet
• Pentameter: Five Feet
• Hexameter: Six Feet
• Heptameter: Seven Feet
• Octometer: Eight Feet

The patterned repetition of stressed and unstressed syllables in a line of poetry

The smallest repeated pattern of stressed and unstressed sylables in a poetic line

• Iambic: An unstressed followed by a stressed syllable u/
• Anapestic: Two unstressed followed by a stressed syllable uu/
• Trochaic: A stressed followed by an unstressed syllable /u
• Dactylic: A stressed followed by two unstressed syllables /uu
• Spondaic: Two stressed syllables //
• Pyrrhic: Two unstressed syllables uu

The use of a word whose sound suggests its meaning, as in clang, buzz, and twang

A word or a phrase that is substituted for another because it is considered a less offensive way of saying something

The repetition of initial consonant sounds in words