Friday, April 30, 2010

How to Read Poetry Closely

The following process may help you comprehend poems more easily.

1.   Realize you will need to read the poem more than once. 

2.   Do not try to interpret the poem during the initial reading.  Enjoy
      the experience, listening to the language.

3.   Be attentive to the title. 

4.   Try to read the poem aloud.  Regardless, read the poem slowly,
      carefully.

5.   Freely write about the poem--focusing, first, on the poem as a
      whole and, second, on particular lines. 

6.   Answer the following questions.
  • Do you like or dislike the poem and why?
  • Is the poem interesting or uninteresting, and which lines evoke your response?
  • Is the poem comprehensible or incomprehensible, and which lines do you think are the latter? 
7.   Read the poem again, being attentive to the rhythm and
      punctuation.  Do not stop at the end of a line if it does not have
      punctuation. 

8.   Look for subjects and verbs, and try to paraphrase the poem.

9.   Determine the theme (universal concept) of the poem. 

10. Determine the speaker, for rarely is it the poet. 

      Remember to use the term speaker, not poet, when discussing a
      poem.  The voice you hear in a poem is not necessarily the
      poet's.  However, when discussing general poetic techniques or a
      poem's structure use poet. 

11. Determine the setting (general locale, historical time, and social
      circumstances). 

12. Examine each word, phrase, clause, line and stanza of the poem
      to determine how they work or do not work together.

13. Focus on the elements of the poem that interest you, but ensure
      you address the following: (1) poetic techniques, (2) structure,
      (3) meaning.

14. Do not try to determine the correct reading.  You want to
      produce an interpretation that you feel is accurate because you
      support it with details from the poem. 

      In other words, you will need to quote words, phrases, clauses,
      lines, stanzas and to explicate them.  Let us suppose I want to
      quote the following.
           I went
           to hell 

           and back
           to Mel.
      How would I format my quotation?  First, I would need to
      introduce it: The speaker states in the first and second stanzas
      that "I went / to hell // and back" (1-3).  What do the slashes
      signify?  / is a linear break; // is a stanzaic break.  The numerals
      following the quotation correspond to the lines of the poem--in
      this case, the first through third lines.  Second, I would need to
      explain fully the quotation: The speaker is completely unhappy
      with his life.  He considers his job hellish, and his wife, Mel, is
      the Devil incarnate.

Friday, April 23, 2010

Past Comments on Poems

This post focuses on imagery, its role in poetry and ways to create it.

One goal of a poet is to make abstract, universal concepts--love, hate, birth, death--concrete.  In other words, you want to individualize abstract concepts; you need to personalize your experiences.  Everyone is familiar with such concepts, but they are not familiar with your observation of or participation in the events relative to the concepts.  To make an emotion or event sensible, you must create images.  The following poem ("The Red Wheelbarrow" 1923) by William Carlos Williams underscores the importance of imagery in poetry.
     so much depends
     upon 

     a red wheel
     barrow 

     glazed with rain
     water 

     beside the white
     chickens.*

What depends on a wet wheelbarrow near some chickens?  Literally the poem relies on it; figuratively poetry relies on imagery.  Williams describes an ordinary object and makes a statement about the nature of poetry.  It is significant that the listener/reader realizes an otherwise useful object as art, which is a response to Immanuel Kant's aesthetic.  The diction and syntax are similar to natural speech, and the short lines offer less information than traditional verse.  However, less is more in this case, for the poem gains momentum through enjambment, and such enjambment intensifies the importance of each noun at the ends of the second, third and fourth stanzas.  The poem depends on the fragmentary images that the speaker connects in an elliptical way. 

Another way to make an emotion or event sensible is to compare it to things that are inherently similar to each other.  Describe the things, using different avenues of sensation.  You do not want to compare the emotion or event to disparate things--things made of fundamentally different and often incongruous elements, things markedly distinct in quality or character.  Rather, you want to extend the initial comparison to similar things.  For example, if I were to describe my love for my girlfriend via comparison to a blouse (attraction based on appearance), I would extend the initial comparison to a sail (longing) then to sheets (sexual attraction).  Fabric is the common thread, the fundamental vehicle of comparison.  Of course, I may irritate my girlfriend like a wool sweater chafes skin and find myself alone and naked beneath a streetlight.
_______________________________________________________
     *Charles Tomlinson, ed., Selected Poems, by William Carlos Williams (New York: New Directions, 1985) 56.

Tuesday, April 20, 2010

Poetry: Diction, Imagery, Rhythm and Form

Some people consider poetry as prose in a concentrative form, so diction (word choice) is of paramount importance.  Poets choose words to create or extend figures of speech, for their sounds, to create or extend images, to create or maintain rhythm, and for formal reasons.

Figurative language is a conspicuous departure from what users of a language apprehend as the standard meaning of words or the standard order of words in order to achieve some special meaning or effect.  Although they are primarily poetic, figures are integral to the functioning of language and indispensable to all modes of discourse.  Figurative language has been divided into two classes: tropes (the use of phrases in ways that effect changes in what we understand to be their standard meaning) and schemes (the departure from standard usage is in the order or syntactical pattern of the words).  The following are classified as tropes: aporia, conceit, epic simile, hyperbole, irony, kenning, litotes, metaphor, metonomy, paradox, periphrasis, personification, pun, simile, synecdoche, and understatement.  A common scheme is a rhetorical question.  (For more information on figurative language, please peruse the post "Common Poetic Techniques and Terms.")

Most poetry depends on sound to convey emotions and images.  Poets often choose words for their sonic textures.  A poet knows or discovers what sounds his words will make and what effect those sounds will have on a reader.  Alliteration is the repetition of the sound of an initial consonant or consonantal cluster in stressed syllables close enough to each other to affect the ear.  Consonance is the repetition of a sequence of two or more consonants but with a change in the interventional vowels.  Assonance is the repetition of identical or similar vowels--especially in stressed syllables--in sequential words.  Rhyme is the repetition of the last stressed vowel and of the speech sounds following that vowel in at least two words.  End rhymes occur at the end of the lines; internal rhymes occur when at least one word in a line rhymes with another word in that line or in a succedent line.  An eye rhyme is two or more words that to the eye seem to rhyme, in that their spelling is nearly identical--both begin differently but end alike--but to the ear (that is, in pronunciation) do not rhyme.  Also known as partial or imperfect rhyme, slant rhyme occurs when the vowels of words at the end of lines are approximate or different and occasionally the consonants are similar rather than identical.  (For more information on the aforementioned techniques, please peruse the post "Common Poetic Techniques and Terms.")

Both the denotations and the connotations of imagery are akin to the word imitate and, hence, refer to a likeness, reproduction, reflection, copy, resemblance or similitude.  Although most poetry contains imagery (word pictures), the majority of poets do not use one image to communicate an idea; rather, they combine images in their poems.  Imagery signifies all the objects and qualities of sense perception in a literary work--whether by description, allusion, or figurative language.  Imagery includes visual (sight), auditory (sound), tactile (touch), thermal (heat and cold), olfactory (smell), gustatory (taste), and kinesthetic (movement) qualities.  Imagery makes a literary work concrete, as opposed to abstract.  [For more information on imagery, please peruse the posts "Details" and "Poetry (a Revisitation): Imagery."]

Rhythm is a recognizable though variable pattern in the beat of the stresses or accents in a stream of speech-sounds.  The prevalent metrical pattern of a poem--for example, iambic pentameter--establishes itself as a norm that controls the reader's expectations, even though the number of lines that deviate from the norm may exceed the number that fit the norm exactly.  Furthermore, rhythm is distinct from intonation--the overall rise and fall in the pitch and loudness of the voice--that a poet uses to reveal the meaning of a poem and to produce a rhetorical effect.  [For more information on rhythm, please peruse the post "Poetry (a Revisitation): Rhythm."]

Form designates patterns of meter, lines and rhyme, and it designates the order and organization of a work.  The Chicago School of criticism makes a distinction between form and structure.  The form of a poem is the particular working of emotional power that the composition is designed to evoke, which functions as its shaping principle.  That formal principle controls and synthesizes the structure of a work--that is, the order, emphasis and rendering of all its component subject matter and parts--into an effective whole of a determinate kind.  Even if you choose not to use conventional structures, you will find that experimenting with and learning about form will ultimately increase your sensitivity to language--whether you write poetry, short stories, or plays.  [For more information on form, please peruse the post "Poetry (a Revisitation): Form."]

Making careful choices about diction and having an understanding of connotations (associative meanings) are crucial.  You must understand what language can and cannot do for you.  Effectively use words, words that connect you and your audience to your poem.  As a poet you must deliberate over your selection of words.  Always have a dictionary and a thesaurus nearby, for you will want to use words that are not in your vocabulary.  Attention to diction will help you take control of your writing--whether you are creating verse, narration or dialogue.  (Refer to the post "Creating a Poem.")

Monday, April 19, 2010

Creating a Poem

This worksheet might help you organize your ideas for a poem.

1.   List several universal concepts (birth, relationships, love, hate
      death, et cetera) that interest you.

2.   Generally describe your thoughts and feelings on one of those
      concepts.

3.   Specifically describe that concept, using only objective details
      (size, shape and color) and sensory details (sight, sound, smell,
      taste and touch).

4.   Compare the concept to something concrete (a specific thing
      perceptible by the senses).  You may want to compare the
      concept to several tangible things. 

5.   What sounds (soft and/or harsh) do you associate with the
      concept?  List some of the letters of the alphabet that correlate
      to the concept.

6.   Create two sets of associative words that rhyme.  An example
      follows.  My roommate perpetuates a state of hate.

7.   To which senses do you want to appeal?  Create images that
      correlate to those senses.  An example follows.  There were
      shards of green glass like grass at the base of the oak.

8.   What rhythm (slow or fast) do you associate with the concept?

9.   Do short lines or long lines best express the concept?

10. Determine a form that coincides with the emotion(s) you are
      attempting to relate to and to evoke from your audience.

11. Create a title that reveals the essence of your poem.

Tuesday, April 13, 2010

Common Poetic Techniques and Terms

This list comprises definitions and examples of numerous poetic techniques and explanations of many poetic terms.

1.   Accent.  Generally accent is the emphasis that some syllables in
      speech bear over others, regardless of how achieved--via pitch,
      stress or length.  In the specific sense, accent is a synonym for
      stress.  Linguistically stress denotes intensity of articulatory
      force, resulting from greater musculatory exertion in forming a
      sound.  Word-stress is in most dictionaries.  After a main entry is
      a pronunciation key.  A high set mark (') indicates an accent.
      Ex.: pro-tag'-o-nist


      Ex.:

2.   Accentual verse.  Accentual verse is verse organized by the
      number of stresses, not by the number of syllables.  True
      accentual verse operates on two principles.  The stress governs
      the rhythm, and the stresses must all be true speech-stresses.
      Ex.:  u   u       /  u    u       /          u     u      /   u     /
              In the season of spring, when the sun is soft
              u     /    u          /      u   u     /      u       /
              I shop for clothes to seclude my skin.

      Ex.:

3.   Adynation.  An overstatement or exaggeration, adynation is a
      rhetorical figure for magnifying an event by comparison with
      something impossible.
      Ex.: I will walk a million miles to see you smile.

      Ex.:

4.   Alliteration.  Alliteration is the repetition of the sound of an
      initial consonant or consonantal cluster in stressed syllables
      close enough to each other to affect the ear.  The term
      sometimes refers to the repetition of an initial consonant in
      unstressed syllables.
      Ex.: In the season of spring, when the sun is soft, I shop for
              clothes to seclude my skin.

      Ex.:

5.   Allusion.  An allusion is a reference, without explicit
      identification, to an historical person, place or event or to
      another literary work.  The poet assumes that (1) prior
      achievements or events are sources of value, (2) readers share
      knowledge with the poet, (3) the incorporation of familiar
      elements is recognizable, and (4) the incorporated and
      incorporating elements are united.  There are six kinds of
      allusion: topical, personal, formal, metaphorical, imitative and
      structural.  In the following lines from T. S. Eliot's The Waste
      Land (1925), the speaker is describing a woman at her modern
      dressing table.  "The Chair she sat in, like a burnished throne, /
      Glowed on the marble."  Eliot is alluding to Cleopatra's barge in
      Shakespeare's Antony and Cleopatra: "The barge she sat in, like
      a burnish'd throne, / Burn'd on the water" (II. ii. 196).

6.   Ambiguity.  Something is ambiguous if it is open to more than
      one interpretation in the context in which it occurs.  Ambiguity
      is evident in the everyday use of a language.  But the subtlety,
      density and depth of meaning figures of speech create have led
      some to conclude that ambiguity is an essential constituent of
      poetry.

7.   Analogy.  Analogy is similarity, as of properties or functions,
      between unlike things that are otherwise not comparable.
      Ex.: The operation of a computer is similar to the working of a
              human's brain.

      Ex.:

8.   Anapest.  An anapest is a metrical foot of two unstressed
      syllables followed by one stressed syllable.
      Ex.:  u   u        /      u        u          /    u       u       
              In the snow there were footprints that
                  /  u    u        /     u  u     /    u     u      /
              dotted the fields as if cupping the dark. 

      Ex.: 

9.   Anaphora.  Anaphora is the repetition of the same word or
      words at the beginning of successive phrases, clauses, sentences
      or lines.
      Ex.: The moon laughed; the moon cried.
                        or
              The moon laughed;
              the moon cried. 

      Ex.: 

10Antithesis.  The placement of contraries side by side--in
       contiguous or parallel phrases or clauses--is antithesis.
       Ex.: T. S. Eliot's "We are the hollow men / We are the stuffed
               men" ("The Hollow Men"). 

       Ex.: 

11.  Aphaeresis.  The omission of a syllable, usually a vowel, from
       the beginning of a word is aphaeresis.
       Ex.: till for until

       Ex.:
   
12.  Apocope.  The omission of a syllable from the end of a word
       is apocope.
       Ex.: sing (Modern English) from singen (Middle English)

       Ex.:
   
13Apostrophe.  A figure of speech that consists of addressing a
       dead person, a thing, or an abstract idea as if it were alive is an
       apostrophe.
       Ex.: Budweiser, my smart friend, why do you make me dumb? 

       Ex.:

14Assonance.  Assonance is the repetition of identical or similar
       vowels--especially in stressed syllables--in sequential words.
       Ex.: The quiet brides, Silence and Time, sliced through their
               nights with delight. 

       Ex.: 

15Asyndeton.  The omission of conjunctions between phrases or
       clauses is asyndeton.
       Ex.: She cried, fought. 

       Ex.: 

16Blank verse.  Blank verse first appeared in Italian poetry of the
       Renaissance then was transplanted to England as the unrhymed
       decasyllable or iambic pentameter.  In England blank verse was
       invented by Henry Howard, Earl of Surey (1517--47), who,
       sometime between 1539 and 1546, translated two books of the
       Aeneid (II and IV) into the "straunge meter."  As blank verse
       developed in England, generic considerations became
       important.  Clearly verse without rhyme is especially suitable to
       long works--permitting an idea to be expressed at whatever
       length is appropriate and not imposing on the language a
       repetitive structure of couplet or stanza, which tend to produce
       conformity in syntactic structures.  The omission of rhyme
       promoted continuity, sustained articulation, encouraged
       enjambment, and maintained relatively natural word order.
       Relatively natural word order makes blank verse a fitting
       vehicle for drama--Shakespeare's blank verse, for example.
       Inversion, suspension, and relative stylistic devices make it
       suitable to epic--Milton's blank verse, for example.  To
       summarize, blank verse has unrhymed lines in iambic
       pentameter.  The lack of end rhymes makes enjambment more
       possible and more effective. 

17Cacophony.  The use of harsh-sounding words, cacophony is
       the quality or fact of being dissonant.  It is the opposite of
       euphony.
       Ex.: The squall screams, careens through the trees. 

       Ex.: 

18Caesura.  In every sentence of some length there will be a
       syntactic juncture or pause between phrases or clauses, usually
       signaled by punctuation but sometimes not.  A caesura is the
       metrical phenomenon that corresponds to such a break in the
       syntax of a line.
       Ex.: Like pages in a book, caesuras cause us to pause. 

       Ex.: 

19.  Canon.  In secular literary criticism, canon has three senses:
       (a) rules of criticism, (b) a list of works by a single author, and
       (c) a list of texts regarded as culturally central or classic.
 
20.  Carpe diem.  A phrase from Horace's Odes (1.11) that enjoins
       full utilization of the present time, carpe diem is the hedonistic
       form of the motif "eat, drink, and be merry...."  Typically, the
       carpe diem injunction is pronounced amid warnings about the
       transience of life, the uncertainty of the future, and the
       inevitability and finality of death ("... for tomorrow we die").
 
21.  Catachresis.  A deliberate misapplication of a word to create
       concentrative meaning, catachresis depends on the
       reader/listener's acceptance of the semantic transference.
       Otherwise he/she will regard it as a mixed metaphor, which is
       a fault.  The following example is from D. G. Friends'
       "Villanelle."
       Ex.: it gathers inside us like rings of heartwood massed
               inside a tree, the years accomplished in turns

       Ex.:
 
22.  Catalog.  A catalog is a list of persons, places, things or ideas
       that have a common denominator, such as heroism or beauty.
       If a catalog shapes the structure and meaning of a poem, then
       the poem is an example of catalog verse.  In antiquity catalog
       verse often had didactic and mnemonic functions, which are
       manifest in the genealogical lists in the Old Testament and in
       Old Germanic verse, but it also had an aesthetic function,
       indicating the vastness of a war or the valor of a warrior,
       which is manifest in the catalog of heroes in Iliad.  Medieval
       and Renaissance poets used the technique to itemize topics
       such as the beauty of women.
 
23Cliche.  A cliche is a trite expression or idea that deviates from
       its ordinary meaning or association.  The use of such
       expressions--"a whole new ballgame"--or ideas--a rose as a
       symbol of love--is unacceptable when creating a poem, unless it
       is for an ironic effect.
       Ex.: 

24Consonance.  In addition to its general meaning of harmony
       (agreement), consonance has been used interchangeably in
       prosody with a wide variety of terms to designate certain phonic
       echoes.  In a definition popular for some time, consonance was
       said to require the repetition in stressed syllables in two or more
       consonantal sounds without the intervening vowel echo (the
       first example).  Through the centuries, however, and especially
       in the 20th century, poets have been echoing final consonants in
       stressed syllables that do not alliterate or rhyme (the second
       example).
       Exs.: You must (1) live and leave, (2) live and move. 

       Exs.:

25Couplet.  Two contiguous lines of verse that function as a
       metrical unit and are so marked, usually, either by rhyme or
       syntax is a couplet.  A couplet is open when the two lines are
       enjambed--that is, when the syntactic and metrical frames do
       not close together at the end of the couplet, the sentence being
       carried forward into subsequent couplets to any length desired
       and ending at any point in the line.
       Ex.: From the warmth of a summer slumber our lady wakes
               late to intermittent melodies and remakes
               her bed.  She gathers the curtains, closes each
               window, and watches the squirrels spiral the beech.

       Ex.:

26Dactyl.  A dactyl is a metrical foot consisting of one accented
       syllable followed by two unaccented syllables.
       Ex.:      /      u      u          /           u        u        /     u  u
               Footprints that tracked through the snow in the
                   /      u       u        /     u    u      /  u  u        /    u   u     /  u  u
               field were like smudges of darkening light in the evening.

       Ex.: 

27Dead metaphor.  An expression that was originally
       metaphorical but no longer functions as a figure of speech and
       is now understood literally is a dead metaphor.
       Ex.: arm of the law 

       Ex.: 

28Decasyllable.  A line of ten syllables is a decasyllable.
       Normally the term refers to the English iambic pentameter.
       Ex.:    u      /  u      /   u        /       u         /    u     /
               The sun is burning bright, the moon is not. 

       Ex.: 

29.  Dialogue.  Dialogue refers to an exchange of words between
       speakers in a literary text and to a literary usage that presents
       the speech of more than one character without specific
       theatrical intentions.

30.  Didactic poetry.  Didactic poetry clearly teaches or instructs.
 
31.  Dimeter.  The English dimeter consists of two feet.  Accentual
       verse--specifically, a line of two stresses but a variable number
       of syllables--is not dimeter.

32.  Dissonance.  The quality of being harsh or inharmonious in
       rhythm or sound is dissonance.  It is akin to cacophony.  Insofar
       as the terms may be distinguished, cacophony means that which
       is harsh-sounding in itself, and dissonance means that which is
       discordant or inharmonious with what surrounds it.  By
       extension the term may also refer to other elements in a poem
       that are discordant in their immediate context: tonality, theme,
       imagery or syntax.  The following example is from Matthew
       Arnold's "Dover Beach" (1867).
       Ex.: Lay like the folds of a bright girdle furled. 

       Ex.: 

33.  Elision.  Elision is the general term for several techniques of
       contraction--aphaeresis, apocope, synaeresis, synaloepha,
       syncope--whereby two syllables become one.  Such techniques
       are not peculiar to poetry.
 
34Ellipsis.  Ellipsis is the most common term for the class of
       figures of syntactic omission (deletion) of a conjunction
       between words or clauses, of a verb, and of a clause,
       particularly a main clause after a subordinate clause (the
       following example).
       Ex.: If you will do it, all will be well; if not, all will smell. 

       Ex.: 

35.  Emotion.  A poem involves at least two people: poet and
       listener (or reader).  A consideration of the emotion of a poet
       must be a descriptive and not a normative inquiry.  A poem
       in itself can never offer conclusive evidence that the poet did
       or did not feel a certain emotion.  Such an external, biographical
       fact can only be established separately.  A well-written poem
       moves the reader.  Nowadays, however, under the influence of
       structuralism, the reading of a poem as an emotional experience
       has moved from the center of attention, replaced by reading as 
       an interpretive activity.
 
36.  Enargeia.  Enargeia is a quality that appeals to an audience's
       senses, principally sight.  By penetrating the visual imagination
       of a reader and involving him/her in the subject of the poem,
       a poet can persuade more effectively.  To achieve enargeia,
       a poet must use his/her visual imagination to conjure a scene
       mentally, represent the vision in the text, evoking an analogous
       image, and produce the concomitant feelings in the mind of the
       reader.  One important descriptive technique is the selection 
       and disposition of significant and specific details.
 
37End rhyme.  The repetition of the last stressed vowel and of the
       speech sounds following that vowel in two or more words at the
       end of verse-lines is end rhyme.
       Ex.: From the warmth of a summer slumber our lady wakes
               late to intermittent melodies and remakes
               her bed.  She gathers the curtains, closes each
               window, and watches the squirrels spiral the beech. 

       Ex.: 

38End-Stopped line.  An end-stopped line is one in which meter,
       syntax and sense come to a conclusion at the line's end.
       Ex.: Rats: they fight the dogs and kill the cats. 

       Ex.:

39Enjambment.  Enjambment is the overflow into the succedent
       poetic line of a syntactic phrase with its intonational contour,
       begun in the preceding line, without a major juncture or pause.
       It is the antonym of end-stopped.
       Ex.: To see you tense as if each leg were a gun
               loaded with leaps....

       Ex.: 

40.  Epanalepsis.  The repetition of a word or words at the beginning
       and end of a line is epanalepsis.  The following example is from
       W. D. Snodgrass' "April Inventory" (1959).
       Ex.: I have not learned how often I
              Can win, can love, but choose to die.

       Ex.:
 
41.  Epithet.  Epithet denotes an adjective or an adjectival phrase
       that characterizes a person or thing.  An example is Homer's
       "the wine-dark sea" which Buck Mulligan in James Joyce's
       Ulysses (1922) parodies with his reference to "the snot-green
       sea."  We use conventional epithets to identify historical or
       legendary figures, such as Catherine the Great and Patient
       Griselda.  The purposes of epithet concern allusion,
       connotation, repetition and meter.
 
42.  Ethos.  Ethos is one means of persuasion.  It is an audience's
       assessment of a poet's moral behavior--including his/her
       honesty, benevolence, intelligence, et cetera.
 
43.  Euphemism.  The substitution of a mild, indirect or vague
       term for one that is harsh, blunt or offensive is an euphemism.
       The following example is from Andrew Marvell's
       "To His Coy Mistress" (1681).
       Ex.: Now let us sport us while we may,
              And now, like amorous birds of prey,
              Rather at once our time devour
              Than languish in his slow-chapped power.

       Ex.:
  
44.  Euphony.  The quality of having pleasant, easily
       pronounceable, or smooth-flowing sounds free from harshness
       is euphony.  It is also the pleasurable effect of such sounds.
       Euphony is the antonym of cacophony.
       Ex.: I have lost love more often than I have won a lover's hand. 

       Ex.: 

45Eye rhyme.  An eye rhyme is two or more words that to the eye
       seem to rhyme, in that their spelling is nearly identical--both
       begin differently but end alike--but to the ear (that is, in
       pronunciation) do not rhyme.
       Ex.: rough and cough 

       Ex.:

46.  Figurative language.  Figurative language is a conspicuous
       departure from what users of a language apprehend as the
       standard meaning of words or the standard order of words
       in order to achieve some special meaning or effect.  Although
       they are primarily poetic, figures are integral to the functioning
       of language and indispensable to all modes of discourse.
       Figurative language has been divided into two classes:
       tropes (the use of phrases in ways that effect changes in what
       we understand to be their standard meaning) and schemes
       (the departure from standard usage is in the order or syntactical
       pattern of the words).  The following have been classified
       as tropes: aporia, conceit, epic simile, hyperbole, irony,
       kenning, litotes, metaphor, metonymy, paradox, periphrasis,
       personification, pun, simile, synecdoche, and understatement.
       Two common schemes are hyperbaton and rhetorical question.
 
47Foot.  A foot is the combination of a strong stress and the
       associative weak stress or stresses that form a metric unit in a
       line.  The relatively stronger-stressed syllable is called stressed;
       the relatively weaker-stressed syllable(s) is called unstressed.
       The four standard feet in English are iamb (the adjective is
       iambic)--an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable,
       anapest (the adjective is anapestic)--two unstressed syllables
       followed by a stressed syllable, trochee (the adjective is
       trochaic)--a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed
       syllable, and dactyl (the adjective is dactylic)--a stressed
       syllable followed by two unstressed syllables.  Most trochaic
       lines lack the final unstressed syllable and such lines are
       catalectic.  Two other feet are spondee (the adjective is
       spondaic)--two successive syllables with equally strong
       stresses--and pyrrhic (the adjective is also pyrrhic)--two
       successive syllables with equally weak stresses.  The later term
       is used infrequently.  Some traditional metrists deny the
       existence of a true pyrrhic, on the grounds that the prevailing
       metrical pattern always imposes a slightly stronger stress on one
       of the syllables.

       A metric line is named according to the number of feet it has:
       monometer (one foot), dimeter (two feet), trimeter (three feet),
       tetrameter (four feet), pentameter (five feet), hexameter (six
       feet), heptameter (seven feet), octameter (eight feet). 

       To describe the dominant meter of a line, identify (a) the
       predominant foot and (b) the number of feet it contains.  To
       scan a passage of verse is to read each line, marking each
       stressed syllable with a / and each unstressed syllable with a u.
       The following is an example of scansion, signified by the
       aforementioned conventional symbols.
       u       /    u     /    u      /     u   u     /      /  u
       A drunken line of kegs and a mop hiding
       u        /   u  u     /  u       /  u       u     /  u   /
       its head in a yellow bucket were all I saw
        u    /     u        /         /   u      /      /u     /
       before the door muffled this very song. 

       The dominant foot is: 

       The prevailing meter is: 

       The primary variation on the dominant foot is: 

48.  Form.  Form is one of the most frequent terms in prosody, and
       it is also one of the most diverse terms in its meanings.  It
       designates a genre or literary type (for example, the lyric form),
       designates patterns of meter, lines and rhyme (for example,
       the verse form), and designates the order and organization
       of a work (for example, sonnet).  Some literary critics regard
       the form of a work as a combination of component parts
       matched to each other according to their mutual fittingness.
       Organic form is like a growing plant that evolves, by internal
       energy, into the organic unity that constitutes its achieved form,
       in which the parts are integral to and interdependent with the
       whole.  Many New Critics use the word structure interchangeably
       with form and regard it as primarily an equilibrium, interaction,
       or ironic and paradoxical tension of diverse words and images
       that contribute to an organized totality of meanings.  Various
       exponents of archetypal theory regard the form of a literary work
       as one of a limited number of plot-shapes that it shares with
       myths, rituals, dreams, and other elemental and recurrent patterns
       of human experience.  Structuralists conceive a literary structure
       on the model of the systematic way that a language is structured.
       The Chicago School of criticism makes a distinction between
       form and structure.  The form of a literary work is the particular
       working of emotional power that the composition is designed
       to evoke, which functions as its shaping principle.  That formal
       principle controls and synthesizes the structure of a work--that
       is, the order, emphasis and rendering of all its component
       subject matter and parts--into an effective whole of a
       determinate kind.
 
49Free verse.  Free verse is distinguished from metrical verse by
       the lack of a structural grid based on the number of linguistic
       units and/or the position of linguistic features.  Some of free
       verse's primary features are nonmetrical structure, grammatical
       breaks, and absence of regular end rhyme.

50.  Haiku.  The Japanese poetic form haiku was originally the
       opening section of a renga, which took shape in the 13th
       and 14th centuries as a sequential form of verse of up to 50
       5-7-5- and 7-7-syllable alternate parts composed in turn by two
       or more poets.  Although developments make a definition
       of haiku impractical, the three-line format and the 5-7-5
       syllabic pattern seems to be the norm in many countries
       outside Japan.
       Ex.:      /      u        /     u    /
              Footprints track across
                  u       /          /     u      /    u
              winter fields: cups of darkness
                  /   u         /        u       /
              leading through the snow.

       Ex.:
  
51.  Hemistich.  A hemistich is a half-line of verse separated
       rhythmically from the other half by a caesura.  In Greek
       and subsequent drama, characters exchange half-lines
       of dialogue to imitate the rhythms of arguments.  In other
       types of poetry, a hemistich may mirror physical or emotional
       disturbanceThe following example is from William Butler
       Yeats' "Adam's Curse" (1902).
       Ex.: "Better go down upon your marrow-bones
               And scrub a kitchen pavement, or break stones
               Like an old pauper, in all kinds of weather;
               For to articulate sweet sounds together
               Is to work harder than all these, and yet
               Be thought an idler by the noisy set
               Of bankers, schoolmasters, and clergymen
               The martyrs call the world."
                                                               And thereupon
               That beautiful mild woman for whose sake
               There's many a one shall find out all heartache
               On finding that her voice is sweet and low
               Replied: "To be born woman is to know--
               Although they do not talk of it at school--
               That we must labour to be beautiful."
   
52Heptameter.  Heptameter is a line of seven feet.
       Ex.:     /     /      /     u      /     u        /     u    u      /   u    /        /
               Kit sits, taps her tail, and waits for her tin of fish: tuna.

       Ex.:

53Heptasyllable.  A line of seven syllables is heptasyllabic.
       Ex.:     /     /      /     u      /     u        /
               Kit sits, taps her tail, and waits.

       Ex.:

54.  Heroic couplet.  A pair of iambic pentameter lines with
       an end rhyme is a heroic couplet.
 
55Hexameter.  Hexameter is a line of six feet.
       Ex.:     /     /      /     u      /     u        /     u    u      /   u    /
               Kit sits, taps her tail, and waits for her tin of fish.

       Ex.:

56.  Hiatus.  Hiatus is the grammatical and metrical term for the
       pause created by the pronunciation of contiguous vowels,
       either within a word or at the end of one word and the
       beginning of an adjacent word.  The effect of the junction
       is a slight pause in delivery.
       Ex.: reality

       Ex.:
 
57.  Hyperbaton.  When a poet deviates from logical or normal
       syntax, it is an example of hyperbaton.  The syntactic dislocation
       may range from the misplacement of a single word, to the
       reversal of a pair of words, to more extreme instances
       of disarray, which often depict extreme emotion.

       Normal word-order is a problematic concept.  In inflectional
       languages, such as Greek and Latin, word-class is marked by
       ending, so syntax is relatively free.  In positional languages,
       such as English, inflections are almost entirely absent and
       word-order determines case.  But often there are several
       acceptable ways to order sentential elements.  All poetry
       and prose is stylistically individualistic to some degree, so
       it is difficult to establish standards against which to measure
       deviance, although extreme instances are obvious.
       Furthermore, usage varies from age to age, each allowing
       different degrees of freedom in word-order.

       The primary syntactic sequence in English is subject-verb-object,
       and the most common form of displacement is subject-object-verb.
       The reasons for hyperbaton extend beyond the needs of meter
       and rhyme and include emphasis.  John Milton uses hyperbatic
       word-order in Paradise Lost (1667) to delay the narrative
       progression of the verse.
       Ex.: ten paces huge / He back recoiled (6.193-194)

       Ex.:
    
58Hyperbole.  A figure of speech, hyperbole is bold
       overstatement or extravagant exaggeration of fact or
       possibility.  It is used for serious, ironic or comical effect.  It is
       similar to adynation.
       Ex.: I've told you a million times not to exaggerate.

       Ex.:

59Iamb.  An iamb is a metrical foot consisting of an unstressed
       syllable followed by a stressed syllable.
       Ex.:      u        /     u         /    u     /     u       /  u      /
               Their footprints track across the winter field.

       Ex.:

60.  Image.  A poetic image may be a metaphor, simile, figure
       of speech, the vehicle (second term) of a metaphor,
       a concrete verbal reference, a recurrent motif, a psychological
       event in a reader's mind, a symbol or symbolic pattern, or the
       global impression of a poem as a unified structure.

61Imagery.  Both the denotations and connotations of imagery
       are akin to the word imitate and, hence, refer to a likeness,
       reproduction, reflection, copy, resemblance or similitude.
       Imagery signifies all the objects and qualities of sense
       perception in a literary work--whether by description, allusion,
       or figurative language.  Imagery includes visual (sight), auditory
       (sound), tactile (touch), thermal (heat and cold), olfactory
       (smell), gustatory (taste), and kinesthetic (movement) qualities.
       Imagery makes a work concrete, as opposed to abstract.

62Internal rhyme.  Internal rhyme occurs when a word at the end
       of a line rhymes with a word or words in the same line, when a
       word at the end of a line rhymes with a word or words in a
       succedent line but not at the end of that line, when words within
       a line rhyme with each other but not with the word at the end of
       the line, or when a word within one line rhymes with a word
       within a succedent line.
       Ex.: The cold, bold man tried
               to sham the woman.

       Ex.:

63Irony.  Irony is a figure of speech by which one indicates--via
       intonation, emphasis and/or gesture--the opposite of what one
       says.  With respect to verbal irony, a statement in which the
       meaning that a speaker expresses differs sharply from the
       meaning he/she intends.  The ironic statement usually involves
       explicit expression of one attitude or evaluation and indications
       in the overall situation that the speaker intends a different, often
       opposite, attitude or evaluation.  For example, I look out of a
       window at a storm and remark to a friend, "It's a beautiful day."

       Ex.:

       Romantic irony designates a mode of writing in which the
       poet creates the illusion of representing reality, only to shatter
       it by revealing that the poet, as artist, is the creator and arbitrary
       manipulator of the speaker and his/her actions.  Byron uses
       romantic irony for comical effect in his narrative poem
       Don Juan (1819--24)

64.  Isocolon.  Isocolon denotes phrases, clauses, lines or sentences
       that are identical in number of syllables, in scansion.  Aristotle
       mentions isocolon in the Rhetoric as the figure which produces
       symmetry in speech and creates rhythmic prose or even measures
       in verse.  The following example is from W. D. Snodgrass'
       "April Inventory" (1959).
       Ex.:    u      /      u      /      u         /      u     /
               Can win, can love, but choose to die.

       Ex.:
 
65.  Line.  The concept of line is fundamental to the concept of
       poetry, for the line is the differentia of verse from prose.  Verse
       is cast in lines and sentences, and prose is cast in sentences and
       paragraphs.  The sense in verse is segmental to increase the
       density of information and the perception of structure, but the
       sense in prose is continuous.  Certainly there are hybrid forms
       of poetry such as prosaic poems and rhythmic prose, but it is
       impossible that there is verse not set in lines.  Listeners and
       readers of poetry perceive the line as a rhythmical and
       structural unit.

66.  Litotes.  Litotes is a figure of speech in which (1) there is an
       affirmation by the negative of the contrary or (2) there is a
       deliberate understatement for purposes of intensification.
       Similar to meiosis, hyperbole, irony and paradox, litotes
       requires that the reader/listener refer to the statement's context
       to perceive the disparity between the words' literal and intentional
       senses.

       The distinction between litotes and meiosis is that, with respect
       to the former, declaring a thing is less than it is emphasizes it
       and, with respect to the latter, declaring a thing is less
       de-emphasizes it.
       Exs.: (1) This is no small problem, and (2) the valedictorian
                 was an above-average student.

       Exs.: 
 
67Meiosis.  Meiosis is the deliberate representation of something
       as less in magnitude or importance than it actually is.  It is the
       opposite of hyperbole.
       Ex.: Mark Twain's comment that "The reports of my death are
               greatly exaggerated."

       Ex.:

68Metaphor.  A metaphor is a trope, or figurative expression, in
       which a word or phrase shifts from its normal usage to a context
       where it evokes new meanings.  In other words, it is a word or
       expression that in literal usage denotes one thing but in another
       context signifies another thing, without the poet asserting the
       comparison.  A mixed metaphor contains two or more diverse
       metaphors.  A dead metaphor is common to the extent that its
       users are not aware of the discrepancy between the vehicle (the
       metaphorical term itself) and the tenor (the subject).
       Ex.: My love is a bottle of scotch (a metaphor).
               We must take arms against this sea of trouble (a mixed
               metaphor).
               The leg of the table broke (a dead metaphor). 

       Ex. of a metaphor: 

       Ex. of a mixed metaphor: 

       Ex. of a dead metaphor: 

69Meter.  Meter is the recurrence, in regular units, of a prominent
       feature in the sequence of speech-sounds of a language.  There
       are four primary types of meter.  In classical Greek and Latin,
       the meter was quantitative--focused on the relative duration of
       the utterance of a syllable and the recurrent pattern of short and
       long syllables.  In the older Germanic languages, including Old
       English, the meter was accentual--focused on the number of
       stressed syllables within a line, without regard to the number of
       intervening unstressed syllables.  In many Romance languages,
       the meter is syllabic--focuses on the number of syllables within
       a line of verse, without regard to the stresses.  The predominant
       meter of English poetry since the fourteenth century is
       accentual-syllabic--focuses on a recurrent pattern of stresses
       on a recurrent number of syllables.  Please refer to Foot. 

70Metonymy.  Metonymy is the substitution of one word for
       another on the basis of some material, causal or conceptual
       relation.  The following examples are the more common types
       of metonymy.
       1.  Container for the thing contained: "I'll have a glass." 

            Ex.: 

       2.  Agent for an act, product or object possessed: "I'm reading
            Wordsworth." 

            Ex.: 

       3.  Time or place for their characteristics or products: "I'll have
            Burgundy." 

            Ex.: 

       4.  Associative object for its possessor or user: "We must depose
            the crown." 

            Ex.: 

       5.  Parts of the body for states of consciousness associated with
            them: head for thought. 

            Ex.: 

       6.  Material for object made of it: ivories for piano keys. 

            Ex.: 

71.  Monometer.  A line that consists of one foot is monometric.

72.  Narrative poetry.  A narrative poem is a verbal presentation
       of a sequence of events or facts whose disposition in time
       implies causal connection and point.
 
73.  Octave.  A stanza of eight lines is an octave.
 
74.  Octosyllable.  A line of eight syllables is octosyllabic.
       Ex.:     /     /    u      /     u      /    u        /
               Kit sits and taps her tail and waits. 

       Ex.: 

75.  Onomatopoeia.  That is the traditional term for words that
       seem to imitate the qualities (sounds, sizes, motions, colors) of
       the things to which they refer.
       Ex.: murmur 

       Ex.: 

76.  Oxymoron.  An oxymoron is a figure of speech that yokes
       together two seemingly contradictory elements.
       Ex.: friendly fire 

       Ex.: 

77.  Paradox.  A paradox is a statement that unites seemingly
       contradictory words but, with closer examination, has an
       unexpected meaning and truth.  It is similar to oxymoron.
       Ex.: Life is death, and death is life. 

       Ex.: 

78.  Parallelism.  The repetition of identical or similar syntactic
       patterns in adjacent phrases, clauses or sentences is parallelism.
       Ex.: The woman laughed; the woman cried. 

       Ex.: 

79.  Pathetic fallacy.  The tendency of poets and painters to imbue
       the natural world with human feeling is pathetic fallacy.
       Ex.: The oak was sad when the squirrel did not return. 

       Ex.:

80.  Pathos.  Evoking an audience's emotions in order to use them
       as a means of persuasion is pathos.

81Pentameter.  That term denotes a meter of five measures or
       feet.
       Ex.:   u        /       u      /     u       /   u    /    u      /
               She came; she saw; she left bereft of sense. 

       Ex.: 

82.  Persona.  Persona refers to the first-person speaker who tells
       the story in a narrative poem or novel.  It also refers to the voice
       we hear in a lyric poem.
 
83Personification.  Personification occurs when a poet endows
       nonhuman objects, abstractions, or creatures with life and
       human characteristics.
       Ex.: The flowers you planted speak to me daily.


       Ex.: 

84.  Pitch.  Pitch (high versus low) is one of the three intonational
       features of sound, the others being intensity (accent or stress)
       and length (duration).
 
85Polysyndeton.  The repetition of conjunctions, normally and,
       polysyndeton is the antonym of asyndeton, which is the
       omission of conjunctions.
       Ex.: She woke and dressed and ate and left. 

       Ex.: 

86.  Prose poem.  With its oxymoronic title and its form based
       on contradiction, the prose poem is suitable for an
       extraordinary range of perception and expression.  Basically
       it is dense, rhythmic prose.
 
87Pun.  A play on words that are either identical in sound
       (homonyms) or very similar in sound but are sharply diverse in
       their meanings is a pun.
       Ex.: the last word in the title of Oscar Wilde's comedy, The
              Importance of Being Earnest (1899). 

       Ex.: 

88.  Pyrrhic.  A metrical foot of two short syllables, some deny
       the pyrrhic is a legitimate foot. 
 
89.  Quatrain.  A stanza of four lines, a quatrain normally has
       end rhymes.
 
90.  Quintain.  Any poem or stanza that has five lines is a quintain.
 
91.  Refrain.  A part of a line, a whole line, or several lines
       that repeat verbatim at regular intervals throughout a poem,
       usually at regular intervals and often at the end of a stanza,
       is a refrain.

       A refrain may be as short as a word or as long as a stanza.
       Though usually recurring as a regular part of a metrical pattern,
       it may appear irregularly throughout a poem, in regular form or
       not, or in free verse.  The refrain may appear each time with
       a slight variation of wording appropriate to its immediate
       context or in a way that its meaning develops from one recurrence
       to the next.  The refrain may be a tag or a nonsensical phrase
       seemingly irrelevant to the remainder of the poem, or it may
       emphasize or reinforce emotion or meaning by echoing or
       elaborating a crucial image or theme.  Regardless, the repetition
       of sound is pleasurable, and refrains segment and correlate
       rhythmic units, unifying poems. 

92.  Repetition.  Repetition of sound, syllable, word, phrase,
       line, strophe, metrical pattern, or syntactic structure is the
       core of any definition of poetry.
 
93Rhetorical question.  A rhetorical question is a clause in the
       grammatical form of a question that a writer asks, not to request
       information or to invite a reply, but to achieve a greater
       expressive force than a direct assertion.  "Isn't a shame?"
       functions as a forceful alternative to the assertion, "It's a
       shame." 

       Ex.: 

94Rhyme scheme.  That term denotes the pattern of rhymes at the
       end of lines (for examples: aa, bb, cc, et cetera; ab, ab, cd, et
       cetera; or abc, abc, def, et cetera).  The following example is
       the sestet of John Keats"On Seeing the Elgin Marbles" (1817).
              Such dim-conceived glories of the brain
       Being round the heart an indescribable feud;
              So do these wonders a most dizzy pain,
       Which mingles Grecian grandeur with the rude
              Wasting of old Time--with a billowy main--
       A sun--a shadow of a magnitude. 

       The rhyme scheme is: 

95.  Rhythm.  A cadence, a contour, a figure of periodicity:
       rhythm is any sequence of events or objects perceptible as
       a distinct pattern capable of repetition and variation.

96.  Satire.  Satire is both a mode of discourse that asserts
       a polemical or critical outlook and a specific literary genre
       that embodies such a mode in either prose or verse.  From
       earliest times satire has tended toward didacticism.  Despite
       the aesthetic and often comic pleasure of satire, their authors
       incline toward self-promotion as judges of morals and
       manners, of thought and behavior.  Numerous satirists ridicule
       or berate the shortcomings of their own times, hoping that their
       values will outlast the occasions or crises of the moment.
 
97 Scansion.  Scansion is the interpretation of the meter of a
       poem.  It is also the graphic transcription thereof, usually by
       symbols (/ and u). 

98Septet.  A septet is a seven-line stanza whose meter and rhyme
       scheme varies.

99.  Sestet.  The minor division or last six lines of a sonnet is
       a sestet.  An octave precedes it.  Sometimes the octave states
       a proposition or situation and the sestet a conclusion.  The
       rhyme scheme of a sestet varies.  In an Italian sonnet it is
       cdecde or cdcdcd.  In an English sonnet it is efefgg.
  
100.  Sexain.  Any stanzaic pattern of six lines is a sexain.
 
101Simile.  An explicit comparison using like or as is a simile.
         The function of the comparison is to reveal an unexpected
         likeness between two seemingly disparate things--in the
         following case, the reduction of tribal African women
         to objects.
         Ex.: "black, naked women with necks
                 wound round and round with wire
                 like the necks of light bulbs" (Elizabeth Bishop) 

         Ex.: 

102Slant rhyme.  Also known as partial or imperfect rhyme, slant
         rhyme occurs when the vowels of words at the end of lines are
         approximate or different and occasionally the consonants are
         similar rather than identical.  The following six-line stanza
         (sexain) is from Wilfred Owen's "Miners" (1931).
         The centuries will burn rich loads
                With which we groaned,
         Whose warmth shall lull their dreamy lids,
                While songs are crooned.
         But they will not dream of us poor lads,
                Lost in the ground. 

         Ex.: 

103Sonnet.  The sonnet is a 14-line poem--normally in
         hendecasyllables (Italian), iambic pentameter (English), or
         alexandrines (French)--whose rhyme scheme has in practice
         varied widely despite the traditional assumption that the
         sonnet is a fixed form.  The three most widely recognized
         versions of the sonnet, with their traditional rhyme schemes,
         are the Italian or Petrarchan (octave: abbaabba; sestet:
         cdecde or cdcdcd), the Spenserian (abab // bcbc // cdcd 
         // ee), and the English or Shakespearean (abab // cdcd //
         efef // gg).  The Spenserian and Shakespearean patterns offer
         some relief to the greater difficulty of rhyming in English and
         invite a division of thought into three quatrains and a closing
         couplet. 

104Speaker.  Use the term speaker, not poet, when discussing a
         poem.  The voice we hear in a poem is not necessarily the
         poet's. 

105Spondee.  A spondee is a foot (metrical unit) of two stressed
         syllables.
         Ex.:     /    /
                 Kit sits. 

         Ex.: 

106Stanza.  A stanza is a group of lines in a poem.  They are
         often set off by a space in the text.  Usually the stanzas of a
         poem have a recurrent pattern of rhyme and are uniform in the
         number and lengths of the component lines.  Some unrhymed
         poems, however, contain stanzas, and some rhymed poems
         contain stanzas that vary in the number of component lines.
         The following are the more common stanzas: couplet, envoy,
         tercet, terza rima, quatrain, heroic quatrain, rime royal, ottava
         rima, Spenserian stanza, villanelle, and sestina.

107Syllabic verse.  The regulation of lines of verse via the
         number of syllables is syllabic verse.
         Ex.:  u   u       /   u   u        /        u      u      /
                 In the season of spring, when the sun
                 u     /    u     /     u         /      u   u     /
                 is soft, I shop for clothes to seclude

         Ex.:

108Syllable.  A syllable has been conceived as (a) one separate
         respiratory movement, (b) one opening and closing of the
         vocal tract aperture, (c)one peak of sonority in the
         soundstream, and (d) fiction.

109Symbol.  In the broadest sense of the term, a symbol is
         anything that signifies something.  With respect to that sense,
         all words are symbols.  With respect to poetry, however, a
         symbol is a word or phrase that signifies an object or event
         which in turn signifies something beyond itself.  Some symbols
         are public; some are private.
         Ex.: the Red, White and Blue

         Ex.:

110.  Synaeresis.  Synaeresis is the coalescing of two vowels
         within a word.
         Ex.: the oi in boil

         Ex.:

111.  Synaloepha.  Synaloepha is the coalescing of two vowels
         across a word boundary--that is, ending one word and
         beginning the next.
         Ex.: th' elite for the elite

         Ex.:
  
112.  Syncope.  Syncope is the shortening of a word by omission
         of a sound, letter or syllable from the middle of the word.
         Ex.: bos'n for boatswain

         Ex.:
  
113.  Synecdoche.  With respect to synecdoche, (1) a part of
         something signifies the whole or, more rarely, (2) the whole
         signifies a part.
         Exs.: (1) hired hands for hired men and (2) reading
                   Shakespeare for reading Hamlet

         Exs.:

114Synesthesia.  With respect to synesthesia, one sense modality is
         felt, perceived or described  in terms of another.
         Ex.: describing a voice as velvety, warm, heavy or sweet.

         Ex.: 

115.  Syntax.  All human language derives its expressive power
         in part from syntax, the placement of words in arbitrary
         but conventional sequences.  More than most other users
         of language, poets exploit such potential when they write.
 
116.  Tercet.  A unit of verse consisting of three lines, usually with
         end rhyme, is a tercet.
 
117Tetrameter.  Tetrameter is a metric line of four feet.
         Ex.:     /    /     u      /     u      /       /   u
                 Kit sits and taps her tail, waiting.

         Ex.:

118.  Theme.  In common usage theme refers simply to the subject
         or topic treated in a discourse or a part of it.  Thus, to speak
         of the theme of a poem may be only to answer the question,
         "About what is this poem?"
 
119.  Trimeter.  A trimeter is a metric line of three feet.
         Ex.:     /    /     u      /     u      /
                 Kit sits and taps her tail.

         Ex.:

120Trochaic.  Trochaic is the term for both metrical units
         and whole meters that have the rhythm /u.
         Ex.:     /    u      /  u        /   u  
                 Kit was sitting, waiting.

         Ex.:

121.  Understatement.  Please refer to Meiosis.

122.  Villanelle.  Traditionally a villanelle is a 19-line poem
         with the following rhyme scheme: A1bA2 // abA1 // abA2 //
         abA1 // abA2 // abA1A2.