This document defines poetry and compares it to prose. It outlines the key elements that make a piece of writing a poem, including rhyme, rhyme scheme, rhythm, meter, stanzas, and figurative language. Rhyme is when words sound the same, usually at the end of lines, while rhyme scheme refers to the pattern of rhymes. Rhythm is the audible pattern created by syllable arrangement. Meter and stanzas relate to the organization of lines. Figurative language involves descriptive techniques that convey meanings beyond the literal. Examples are provided to illustrate these poetic elements.

1. What Makes
a Poem?
Differences between Poetry and Prose

2. Definitions
• Poem: a piece of writing that usually has
figurative language and that is written in
separate lines (stanzas) that often have a
repeated rhythm and sometimes rhyme
• Prose: ordinary writing

3. Key Elements
of Poetry
• Rhyme
• Rhyme Scheme
• Rhythm
• Meter
• Stanzas
• Figurative Language
What, exactly, makes a
poem a poem?

4. Rhyme
Words that sound the same and are usually placed at the
END of a line of poetry.
Example:
Silent night,
Holy night,
All is calm
All is bright

5. Rhyme Scheme
• The pattern of the rhymes in poems.
We label rhyme scheme like this:
Silent night a
Holy night a
All is calm b
All is bright a

6. Rhythm
• When the arrangement of syllables creates an
audible pattern or beat when read out loud.
Example:
Double, double toil and trouble;
Fire burn, and cauldron bubble.

7. Can you see the rhyme and
rhythm?
Life is mostly froth and bubble,
Two things stand like stone,
Kindness in another’s trouble,
Courage in your own.
- Adam Lindsay Gordon

8. Meter
• Meter is the pattern that the rhythm takes in a
poem.
• Similar to what a rhyme scheme is for rhyme.
Example:
“His noisy snoring woke the neighbors'
dog.”

9. Stanzas
• A unit or a group of lines in poetry that are
usually related to a single idea.
OR
• How we organize the lines in poetry.

10. Find the Stanzas

11. Figurative Language
• Speech or writing that departs from literal
meaning in order to achieve a special effect or
meaning.
OR
• Words or expressions that mean something
different from their literal meaning.

12. Types of Figurative
Language
• Simile
• Metaphor
• Hyperbole
• Personification
• Onomatopoeia
• Idioms
• She was as beautiful as
the sun.
• She was a rose in bloom.
• Everyone was losing their
heads!
• The wind howled sadly.
• BOOM! Went the
cannons.
• Out of the blue, the dog
attacked!