Glossary of Poetic Terms: Paeon to Pyrrhic Meter.

A metrical foot (of Greek origin) containing one long syllable and three short syllables. The position of the long syllable can be varied hence the so-called first, second, third or fourth paeon.

Word, phrase or line of verse which reads the same forwards or backwards e.g. ‘Able was I ere I saw Elba.’

Poem which retracts a statement made in a previous poem.

Poem which praises or eulogizes something or someone.

Verse form of Malayan origin featuring interlinked quatrains rhyming a-b-a-b.

The structure of the pantoum is similar to that of the villanelle. It was used by French poets including Charles Baudelaire and introduced into English by Henry Austin Dobson.

Seemingly absurd statement which, on closer examination, reveals an important truth e.g. Wordsworth’s ‘ The child is father of the man’.

Phrases or sentences placed side by side which exhibit repetition of structure or meaning. Parallelism is particularly a feature of religious verse (especially Hebrew) or of incantations.

A more modern example is the beginning of T.S. Eliot’s Ash-Wednesday

‘Because I do not hope to turn again
Because I do not hope
Because I do not hope to turn’

Term coined by Edmund Blunden to describe a form of ‘near rhyme’ where the consonants in two different words are exactly the same but the vowels vary. Pararhyme is particularly a feature of the poetry of Wilfred Owen. For example, in Owen’s unfinished poem Strange Meeting we find lines ending with words such as ‘groaned’ and ‘groined’ and ‘hall’ and ‘Hell’.

Pararhyme is more commonly known as double consonance.

The use of clauses (one after the other) but without conjunctions e.g. Caesar’s ‘I came, I saw, I conquered’.

Imitation of a poem or another poet’s style for comic/satiric effect. In Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland Lewis Carroll’s poem Old Father William is a parody of The Old Man’s Comforts by Robert Southey.

See also my poem Cock-Eyed Beauty which is a parody of Pied Beauty by G.M. Hopkins.

Literary work composed of material taken from various sources or written in the style of other poets/authors.

A poem about idyllic rural life – often featuring the life of shepherds. Early examples of the form include the idylls of Theocritus and the eclogues of Virgil. Milton’s poem Lycidas is also an example of a pastoral poem. Pastorals tended to die out with the rise of romanticism.

Term coined by Ruskin to describe a tendency of poets (particularly Wordsworth) and painters to attribute human feelings to nature.

Poetry (or other literature) which evokes pity or sadness in the reader e.g. Send No Money by Philip Larkin. Carried too far, pathos can become bathos.

Written by poets from poor backgrounds e.g. the work of John Clare and Robert Bloomfield. Often concerned with rural issues or nature. Bloomfield’s The Farmer’s Boy would be a classic example.

Literary pseudonym.

A line of poetry comprising of five metrical ‘feet’. Shakespeare’s plays were largely written in iambic pentameter. See meter and Shakespeare’s line.

Poetry that is performed ‘live’ in pubs and clubs – usually from memory. In the UK, performance poetry is often humorous in nature e.g. John Hegley, John Cooper Clarke, Ivor Cutler and Atilla the Stockbroker etc. Performance poetry was pioneered in the UK by Adrian Mitchell and the Liverpool Poets (Roger McGough, Adrian Henri and Brian Patten.)

Black poets such as Benjamin Zephaniah and Linton Kwesi Johnson have also reached a wide audience through performing their own poetry.

Circumlocution (or roundabout speaking) employed for poetic effect.

Figure of speech whereby inanimate objects or abstractions are given human characteristics. In his poem Low Water Ted Hughes uses personification to describe a river e.g.
‘She lolls on her deep couch. And a long thigh
Lifts from the flash of her silks.’

Personification is a form of metaphor.

Poundian term to describe a poem which relies upon ‘throwing a visual image on the mind’. He went on to say that this is particularly exemplified by Chinese poetry because the Chinese language is composed of pictograms. See also logopoeia and melopoeia which, according to Pound, make up the tripartite division of poetry.

The use of unnecessary or superfluous words. Poets often fall into this trap when trying to pad out a metrical line e.g. the clown’s song from Shakespeare’s Twelfth Night.

When that I was and a little tiny boy,
With hey, ho, the wind and the rain,
A foolish thing was but a toy,
For the rain it raineth every day.

Originally a metrical composition. However, many modern poets no longer use meter so a more accurate definition might be: a concentrated or charged piece of writing; often featuring stanzas and line breaks.

Term coined by Alfred de Vigny to define epic or dramatic poems presenting philosophic thoughts.

The making of poetry. It derives from the Greek word ‘to make’ and eventually became the English word ‘poetry’ via ‘poesie’ and ‘poesy’.

Archaic word for poetry. Shelley uses it in the first stanza of his long poem The Mask of Anarchy.

A writer of poems.

An inferior poet.

An under appreciated poet. In French, it literally means the ‘cursed poet’.

A female poet.

Exhibiting the good qualities of poetry.

The particular language (words and phrases) employed by poets. Poetic diction has changed much over the centuries. Traditionally poetry was associated with a certain ‘floweriness’, but since the advent of modernism this has been replaced by a more sparse lexicon. Modern poets have also tended to avoid elision such as ne’er or ’tis and also the use of archaic terminology such as thee, thy and thou.

To make poetical.

The justice meted out by poets (in an ideal world) – where virtue is rewarded and vice punished.

The freedom of poets to depart from the normal rules of written language and/or literal fact in order to create an effect. This often occurs when poets use inventive figurative language.

To write or compose poetry.

The work of a poet. The exalted, expressive, elevated use of words. Coleridge defined it as: ‘the best words in the best order.’ Poetry is, however, a highly subjective term. One man’s poetry is another man’s schmaltz! Compare with verse.

Form of performance poetry pioneered by Marc Smith in Chicago U.S.A.. Poetry Slam takes the form of a competitive poetry reading where participants read their own poems from memory and are marked on their performance by judges.

A poem presenting a controversial discussion e.g. Milton’s Areopagitica (1664).

The repetition of conjunctions (in close proximity) e.g. ‘and’ in The Lonesome Death of Hattie Carroll by Bob Dylan.

Factitious word created by blending the sounds and meanings of two other words e.g. ‘slithy’ from Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky which is a combination of ‘lithe’ and ‘slimy’. See also neologism.

Alternating lines of iambic hexameter and iambic heptameter.

In the style of Ezra Pound i.e. highly eclectic.

Classical foot consisting of four short or unstressed syllables. Also known as proceleusmatic.

The introductory section of a poem or literary work. In The Canterbury Tales Chaucer employed a general prologue but also individual prologues e.g. The Franklin’s Prologue and The Reeve’s Prologue. See also epilogue.

Piece of writing which features the charged language normally associated with poetry but which does not feature stanzas or line breaks. An example of a prose poem is Season in Hell by Rimbaud.

The formal study of the structure of verse including rhyme, meter, rhythm, stanzaic pattern, alliteration, consonance, assonance, language use etc.

From the Greek meaning to ‘make’ a ‘person’ – hence the personification of inanimate objects or abstractions.

Similar to epithalamion but written prior to the wedding in question. In 1596 Spenser published Prothalamion to celebrate the double marriage of Lady Elizabeth and Lady Katherine – daughters of the Earl of Worcester.

Reviews which overpraise or laud unworthy work; usually produced by literary cliques. Probably originated from the character Mr Puff in Sheridan’s play The Critic. See log-rolling.

Playful device where similar sounding words with different meanings, or single words with multiple meanings are employed. Shakespeare frequently used puns for both comic and serious effect e.g. in Romeo and Juliet the dying Mercutio says: “Ask for me tomorrow, and you shall find me a grave man.”

William Empson identified puns as a form of ambiguity.

Poetry that does not try to educate, instruct or convert the reader – as opposed to didactic verse. An example of pure poetry would be Ariel’s Songs by William Shakespeare.

Pejorative term for an excessively ornate or florid passage of writing.

A metrical foot comprising two unstressed syllables.