Is This a Poem?: What makes a poem, and how YOU can write one

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Lay your sleeping head, my love …’: so begins this, one of the tenderest, and most honest and beautiful, love poems in all of twentieth-century literature. Similar to repetition, anaphora is where a word or words is repeated at the beginning of successive phrases, clauses, or lines. It's most famously used in Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.’s 'I Have a Dream' speech. Elegy: a poem or song that is written in dedication to someone who has died. They often go into detail about the deceased person’s life, their attributes, what they accomplished, and who they left behind. There is usually an emphasis placed on what the world is going to be like now that they are gone. Examples include: ‘ The Truth the Dead Know‘ by Anne Sexton and ‘ On My First Daughter‘ by Ben Jonson. Though its author was known for a life of adventure and scandal, Lord Byron’s poem ‘She Walks in Beauty’ refers notably less to passionate or sexual love compared to his other works. That said, his astonishment at this woman’s beauty comes across instantly, making this a beautifully romantic poem. 13. "Love is a fire that burns unseen" by Luís Vaz de Camões Love is a fire that burns unseen, a wound that aches yet isn’t felt, an always discontent contentment, a pain that rages without hurting,

Katherine Mansfield has been praised for her ability to simplify complex emotions through short stories and poetry. One of the more tranquil poems on this list, ‘Camomile Tea’ paints a picture of a couple who are calm and quiet and happy with the life they’ve made for themselves, highlighting the underrated joy that peaceful familiarity and comfort can bring in a relationship. 40. "Love Elegy in the Chinese Garden, with Koi" by Nathan McClain Because who hasn’t done that — Edna St. Vincent Millay’s ‘Renascence’ is a moving poem and the one that brought her writing into the public spotlight. It follows a speaker as she lives, dies, and then is reborn in a newly faithful form. There are powerful images used throughout the lines, despite the fact that Millay wrote this poem when she was only nineteen. The poet explores themes of suffering, time, rebirth, and spirituality.Here are a few lines from the first stanza:

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Widely regarded as the ‘Father of English poetry’, Geoffrey Chaucer wrote some of the most renowned works of the English language, including ‘The Canterbury Tales’ and ‘The Book of the Duchess’. The standalone poem ‘Rondel of Merciless Beauty’ (here translated from Middle English) recounts Chaucer’s heartbreak after being left by the love of his life, pledging his everlasting devotion to her even though it pains him. 16. "Love Comes Quietly" by Robert Creeley Poems come in lots of different forms and styles and the text is often separated into paragraphs which are called stanzas.

A sonnet is a poem with 14 lines that is traditionally about the topic of love. Sonnets have internal rhymes and typically end with a heroic couplet (a rhyming couplet written in iambic pentameter). In ‘Heart to Heart’, Rita Dove rejects the typical clichés that come with falling in love. With her down-to-earth approach to the topic, she assures the intended reader that although she may struggle to show her love, that doesn’t mean it’s not there. 25. "Love" by Carol Ann Duffy you’re where I stand, hearing the sea, crazy for the shore, seeing the moon ache and fret for the earth. When morning comes, the sun, ardent, covers the trees in gold, you walk A poem about grieving may be needlessly melodramatic and bone-crushingly dark, all just to create a mood.Repetition is used both for decoration, as is the case when repeating the same vowel or consonant sound several times in a line, and for technical purposes. From the initial planning stages to the rough drafts to the editing process, all of it is a critical piece in creating a poem. Political activist, poet, and essayist June Jordan is one of the most widely-published Jamaican American writers of her generation. In her ‘Poem for My Love’, the speaker is in absolute spiritual awe of her partner and the way she feels about their transcendent love. 35. "for him" by Rupi Kaur no, it won’t be love at first sight when we meet it’ll be love at first remembrance ‘cause i’ve recognized you in my mother’s eyes when she tells me, marry the type of man you’d want to raise your son to be like. In some poems, sentences run between lines without any punctuation to separate them. This poetry term is defined as enjambment. It helps to create a certain flow and rhythm within the poem. Hyperbole Although you will expect me to I was wiser too than you had expected For I knew all along you were mine

The speaker in Lisa Olstein’s ‘Dear One Absent This Long While’ is anxiously waiting for her loved one to return home. The nervous buzz of anticipation as the speaker waits to return to a life of comfort and mundanity, a puzzle from which their lover is the only missing piece, gives this love poem a beautiful raw honesty. 45. "My Lover Is a Woman" by Pat Parker my lover is a woman & when i hold her feel her warmth i feel good feel safe A free verse poem doesn’t have a consistent rhyme scheme, rhythm, or musical form. These types of poems may also be called prose poetry because they combine techniques from both poetry and prose. Free verse is similar to blank verse, in that it doesn't rhyme. However, free verse has no metre at all, unlike blank verse. Comparisons, especially in the case of metaphors, have various uses in a poem, and their importance is second only to imagery. The words of 13th-century Persian poet Rumi have transcended national, ethnic, and religious divides for centuries. The passion and dedication in ‘Defeated by Love’ is apparent in each line, making this enduring testament to the power of love one of the most beautiful love poems on our list. 53. "Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? (Sonnet 18)" by William Shakespeare Each stanza of Langston Hughes’ ‘A Love Song for Lucinda’ compares love to a specific feeling, all of which are linked to the natural world. This poem emphasizes the exhilaration of falling in love and the all-encompassing enchantment that comes with it. 34. "Poem for My Love" by June JordanA poem is a piece of writing, usually using some kind of rhyme scheme or metrical pattern, that expresses a writer’s feelings (or the feelings of a persona). They can tell stories, record memories, express desire, and share information. The best poems are those that tap into the universality of human experience and appeal to a wide variety of readers. While today most poems are written without a set form, below, readers can explore a few formal possibilities. To understand the form of a poem you can start by looking at its shape. Ask yourself some of the following questions:

There are numerous types of poems that readers may or may not be familiar with. Some are listed below: Now you're familiar with poetry terms and definitions, you can help your pupils to read, analyse and write poetry. Famous poets and poems A type of literary work that uses language artistry, symbolism, and rhythming techniques to express a thought or an emotion, or to describe a story It’s hard to imagine what an overfilled brain looks like, but when you compare it to a jar of marbles that’s already spilling over, the reader can envision it much more clearly.Alliteration is the repetition of sounds through consecutive (or closely connected) words. An example of alliteration is when two or more words in a row begin with the same letter or sound. E.g. big blue butterflies. Symbolism The poet uses a combination of rhythm, word choice, sounds, rhymes, structure and more to create a piece of writing that stirs the reader’s feelings. It was written for Maud Gonne, the woman Yeats loved for many years and viewed as his chief muse. They never married, although Yeats asked her on several occasions. Joseph Hone, one of Yeats’s best biographers, records that Yeats once commented in a lecture that another of his poems, ‘ The Cap and Bells‘, was the way to win a woman, while ‘He Wishes for the Cloths of Heaven’ was the way to lose one. Epic: a long narrative poem that tells the story of heroic deeds, normally accomplished by more-than-human characters. They show extreme courage and outshine their contemporaries in their bravery. Epic poems are the product of preliterate societies or those in which reading and writing were uncommon.Examples include: ‘ Paradise Lost’by John Milton, ‘ The Divine Comedy’by Dante Alighieri, and ‘The Metamorphoses’by Ovid.