This document provides definitions and examples of various poetic devices and forms. It defines lines and stanzas as the basic building blocks of poems. It also defines common poetic devices like imagery, metaphor, personification, rhyme and rhythm. Additionally, it discusses humor in poetry and provides examples of funny poems in the form of limericks that utilize rhyme and rhythm to create humor.

1. Poetry
Vocabulary

2. 1. In poetry, a line is kind of like a row
of seats in a movie theater. Lines
are the text that takes up one line,
or row, in a poem. Poems can have
any number of lines. How many lines
can you find in this poem?

3. 2. A Stanza is a group of lines that form a
Unit or paragraph in a poem. How many
stanza’s in this poem?

4. Adverbs

5. 9. Image:
– A word or phrase that appeals to one
or more of the five senses
10. Lyric Poem:
– Highly musical verse that expresses
the observations and feelings of a
single speaker
11. Metaphor:
– A figure of speech in which something
is described as though it were
something else

6. 12. Mood:
– The feeling created in the reader by
a literary work
13. Narrative Poem:
– A story told in verse
14. Onomatopoeia:
– The use of words that imitate sounds
15. Personification:
– A type of figurative language in which
a non-human subject is given human
characteristics

7. 16. Refrain:
– A regularly repeated line or group of
lines in a poem
17. Repetition:
– The use, more than once, of any
element of language
18. Rhyme:
– Repetition of sounds at the end of
words
19. Rhyme Scheme:
– A regular pattern of rhyming
words in a poem

8. 20.Rhythm:
– Pattern of beats or stresses in
spoken or written language
21. Simile:
– A figure of speech that uses
like or as to make a direct
comparison between two unlike
ideas
22.Stanza:
– A formal division of lines in a poem
considered as a unit
My love is like a red rose.

9. Poetry
Humor & Poetry

10. Humor
• Humor in poetry can arise
from a number of sources:
– Surprise
– Exaggeration
– Bringing together of
unrelated things
• Most funny poems have two
things in common:
– Rhythm
– Rhyme

11. Rhythm & Rhyme
• Using more spirited language makes
humorous situations even more humorous
“The Porcupine”
By Ogden Nash
Any hound a porcupine nudges
Can’t be blamed for harboring grudges.
I know one hound that laughed all winter
At a porcupine that sat on a splinter.

12. If you take away the rhythm
and rhyme, the humor vanishes.
Any hound that touches a porcupine
Can’t be blamed for holding a grudge
I know one hound that laughed all
winter long
At a porcupine that sat on a piece of
wood

13. Limericks
• A limerick is a poem of five lines
• The first, second, and fifth lines
have three rhythmic beats and rhyme
with one another.
• The third and fourth lines have two
beats and rhyme with one another.
• They are always light-hearted,
humorous poems.

14. Limericks
There once was a man with no hair.
He gave everyone quite a scare.
He got some Rogaine,
Grew out a mane,
And now he resembles a bear!

15. Another Limerick
There once was a man from Beijing.
All his life he hoped to be King.
So he put on a crown,
Which quickly fell down.
That small silly man from Beijing.

16. This powerpoint was kindly donated to
www.worldofteaching.com
http://www.worldofteaching.com is home to over a
thousand powerpoints submitted by teachers. This is a
completely free site and requires no registration. Please
visit and I hope it will help in your teaching.