Poetry

Learning intention
After this unit, students will be able to:
understand what poetry is and how a
poem work
understand the figurative language
recognise various structures of poetry
understand the techniques of poetry
develop skills in analysing poetry
experiment with different kinds of poems

How does a poem work?

Subject matter -what is the poem about?

An object? An event? An idea? An emotion?
Theme- the poets message.
what does the poet want to communicate to me?
Moods and emotions
happy? Sad? Pleased?
Techniques
word choice, imagery, sounds, rhythm
Form/Structure- how is the poem shaped? What
rhymes and rhythms does it use?
14-line sonnet? An ode? A lyric poem?

Quiet Night Thoughts

I wake, and moonbeams play around
my bed,
Glittering like hoar-frost to my
wandering eyes;
Up towards the glorious moon I raised

What is figurative
language ?
Creative Word Choice

Creates images in our mind

makes reading and writing more
interesting

figurative language - simile

A comparison of two unlike things
using the words like or as
Examples:
She ran like a cheetah.
He is as tall as a tree.
She walks as slow as a turtle.

Simile

As black as
coal
As light as feather
As clean as a whistle
As quick as a flash
As hungry as a wolf
As proud as apeacock
As sharp as a needle
As heavy as a lead
He swim like a fish

Metaphor
A comparison of two unlike things
WITHOUT using the words like or as.
Examples:
She is a cheetah.
He is a tall tree.
She is a turtle.

Personification
Applying human characteristics to nonhuman objects.

Examples:
The sun smiled at me.
The clouds cried tears of sorrow.
The grass tickled my feet.

Hyperbole
An intentionally exaggerated figure of
speech that goes beyond what is true
or normal.

Examples:
I have a ton of homework tonight.
I am so hungry I could eat 20 pizzas!
I could sleep for a year.

Idioms
An idiom is an expression whose literal
meaning cannot be understood from the
combined meaning of its actual words.

Examples:
It was a piece of cake.
Break a leg
In bocca al lupo translated literally means
in the mouth of the wolf
what is actually means is good luck

Types of Poems
1. Haiku poems-snapshot of a moment in
a poets experience-a description of
something/ a feeling that a poet experience.

-traditional form of Japanese verse.

- three lines of poetry,
The first line has 5 syllables
The second line has 7 syllables, and
The last line has 5 syllables

Haiku poems example

Matsuo Basho- 17th Japan,
should capture a vision into the
nature of the world

Types of Poems

2. Simile Poems

A literary technique or figure of speech that

compares one thing to another by saying it is
like or as theFreedom
other thing.
is
Like a left blowing freely,
Like a bike doing a wheelie.
Like a fish swimming a
stream,
Like a gymnast on a beam.
Like a hawk soaring through
the air,
Like a big wheel ar the fair.
Like a cat chasing its tail,
Like the wing, rain and hail.
Like a kite up in the sky,
Like a bee zooming by.
Like a flower soaking up the
sun,
Like a toddler having fun.
Claire Grierson

Types of Poems

3. Metaphor Poems

-makes a comparison, asking us to picture it as though it is the

other thing
- Direct comparison without using the words like or as

Types of Poems
4. Personification poems
-The characteristics and qualities of a person are
attributed to an animal or an object.

The Moon
The Moon was but a chin of
gold
A Night or two ago
And now she turns Her perfect
Face
Upon the World below
Emily Dickinson

The sounds of Poetry

Onomatopoeia
Alliteration
Assonance
Rhyme

Onomatopoeia
A word that imitates
the sound it represents
Guess the missing letter to
make an onomatopoeia
word:

1. C _ _ S H
2. B_ _ M
3. P_P
4. P_ _ G

Onomatopoeia-Example

Bellbirds
Bellbirds chiming in the bush
While the ice-cubes clink,
clink,
In my glass of orange-juice
William Hart-Smith

Alliteration
The repetition of the same consonant sound
within a poem or piece of writing.
E.g.:
Sally sells seashells at the sea shore.
I fell on the phone.

Assonance
The repetition of the same vowel sound, followed
by different consonant sounds.

Example of Assonance

Rhyme
/rm/

The repetition of similar endsounds in words, placed at the end

of lines of poetry.
=> end-rhyme
E.g.
Behind the screen
was a world of green

End-Rhyme
There is one fault that I must find with the twentieth
century, a
And Ill put it in a couple of words: Too adventury.
a
What Id like would be some nice dull monotony
b
If anyones gotony.
b

Internal Rhyme
I had written him a letter which I had, for want of
better knowledge, sent to where I met him down the
Lachlan years ago;
He was shearing when I knew him, so I sent the letter
to him,
Just on spec, addressed as follows, Clancy, of the
Overview.
A.B.Paterson

Poetry in motion
The rhythm of a poem conveys a sense of
motion and movement.

The rhythm is made up of the beat, or accents,

contained in the words.

Conveys sensation of urgency and speed, a

feelings or laziness of heaviness.

Thunder and Lightning

Blood punches through every vein
As lighting strips the window pane.
Under its flashing whip, a white
Village leaps to light.
On tubs of thunder, fists of rain
Slog I outof sight again.
Blood punches the heart with fright
As rain belts the village night.
James Kirkup

Form/Structure
An ode-meaning to sing or chant, and belongs to the
long and varied tradition of lyric poetry.

Form/Structure
A lyric poem-is a formal type of poetry which
expresses personal emotions or feelings,
typically spoken in the first person.

Sonnet Number 18, written by William

Shakespeare
Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?
Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of
May,
And summer's lease hath all too short a
date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven
shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed,
And every fair from fair sometime declines,

Form/Structure
14-line sonnet
How like a winter hath my absence been
From thee, the pleasure of the fleeting year!

What freezings have I felt, what dark days seen

What old December's bareness everywhere!

And yet this time removed was summer's time,

The teeming autumn, big with rich increase,
Bearing the wanton burden of the prime,

Like widowed wombs after their lords' decease:

Yet this abundant issue seemed to me
But hope of orphans, and unfathered fruit,
For summer and his pleasures wait on thee,
And thou away, the very birds are mute.
Or, if they sing, 'tis with so dull a cheer,

That leaves look pale, dreading the winter's nea

William Shakespeare

Feelings and ideas