Poetic Forms

Poetic Forms

1. Allegory: a work, with another menaing below the surface one

2. Ballad: Tells a story in short stanza's, with simple and direct language

3. Blank verse/unrhymed iambic pentameter: a line with ten syllables and five stresses: 'If music be the food of love, play on.'

4. Leonine rhyme: an internal line within a line of poetry: 'With throats unslaked, with black lips baked.'

5. Lyric: a short poem, often intended to be sung which expresses moods and emotions.

6. Elegy: an expression of bereavement.

7. Free verse: a modern form of poetry where there are no rigid rules governing rhyme and rhythm.

8. Ode: an address to one subject that adopts an elevated manner.

9. Narrative poem: a poem that tells a story.

10. Epic: a long work that concerns a hero acting out a country's history.

11. Satire: comedy that mocks human folly or vices.

12. Rhyming couplet: two consecutive lines that rhyme, often at the end of poems.

13. Pastoral: a rural poem with the poem often writing as a shepherd or countryman and extolling the ideal world of the countryside.

14. Rhyme Royal: a poem of seven stanzas following the rhyme pattern ABABBCC.

15. Sonnet: a 14 line poem of which there are two main types

    • Petrarchan sonnet: split into an eight line section usually rhyming ABBAABBA (the octave) followed by a six line section (the sestet) which can vary in rhyme

16. Metaphysical: deals with questions that can't be explained by science. Metaphysics can cover a broad range of topics from religion to consciousness; however, all the questions about metaphysics ponder the nature of reality.