We read the newspaper to get information.

We read fiction
to enjoy a story. Why do we read poetry? A poem can
create many different things for the reader-powerful
emotions, musical language, vivid sights and sounds.

Poets choose words carefully, for their everyday meanings as

well as the associated feelings certain words create. Poets
also pay attention to the sound of the words, using rhyme
and rhythm to add layer to meaning.

By using Language in a unique way, poems can help you see

something-an object, a feeling, a picture-in a whole new
light.
m Poetry is a composition with an imaginative
awareness of experience expressed
through meaning, sound, and rhythmic
language choices so as to evoke an
emotional response. Poetry has been
known to employ meter and rhyme, but this
is by no means necessary. Poetry is an
ancient form that has gone through
numerous and drastic reinvention over time.
The very nature of poetry as an authentic
and individual mode of expression makes it
nearly impossible to define.
m A |
 is a person who writes poetry. A poet's
work can be literal, meaning that his work is
derived from a specific event, or metaphorical,
meaning that his work can take on many
meanings and forms. Poets exist in nearly all
languages, and have produced works that
vary greatly in different cultures and time
periods. Throughout each civilization and
language, poets have used various styles that
have changed through the course of literary
history, resulting in a history of poets as diverse
as the literature they have produced.
m jne of the divisions of a poem
composed of two or more lines usually
characterized by a common pattern of
meter, rhyme, and number of lines.
m A stanza is NjT a line.
m A stanza of a poem equals to a
paragraph of an essay, without the
indentation.
tanzas are pretty easy to spot. They are groups of lines together,
and there is a blank line in between to separate the stanzas. o,
if your poem looked like this:

line 1
line 2
line 3

line 4
line 5
line 6

line 7
line 8
That is 3 stanzas. Two with three lines each, and one "couplet," or
two-line stanza.
m The line of a poem refers to the single
sentence or phrase of a poem. The
length of the lines in a poem will affect
the meaning of the words within those
lines, as well as the sound and rhythm as
the poem is read.
m hythm is the beat of the words in a poem.
When you tap your foot to a song, you are
tapping to the rhythm. (Try tapping your
foot to a poem-it can be done) some
poems have a predictable, regular rhythm,
which is called a meter.
m If you write a poem about peaceful
moonlight, the rhythm might be slow and
soft, as if it could lull you to sleep. If you
write about anger, you might use a faster
beat, like footsteps stomping out of a room.
m ^any poems have rhymes ²that is, words
ending in the same sound. When rhymes
occur at regular intervals or at the end of
many lines, the poem has a rhyme
scheme.
m hymes make the poem interesting and
fun to listen and to help guide the
reader·s attention. Poet might use
rhymes at the end of lines (end rhyme) to
emphasize certain words
m Poets often use repetition-of lines, words,
or sounds. epetition of particular words
or lines helps them gain meaning in a
poem. You might know them my heart
after reading the poem just a few times.
In a song (which is also a poem)
repeated lines are called refrain
m Poems are filled with imagery-sight, sound, smells, taste, textures
created in the reader·s mind. jne important way to create
imagery is with figurative language. That·s when poets make
creative and unusual comparisons between things.
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m èigurative language is often used to compare things that are
quite different but have something in common. A subway train
and thunder are different, but both make loud rumbling noises.
m imile uses the word as or like to make the comparison (the
subway is like thunder)
m ^etaphor asks the reader to pretend that one thing actually is
another (his face is a prune).
m Personification gives a nonhuman object human qualities (the
sun winks like a person).