INTRODUCTION TO POETRY

Definition of Poetry

poetry has no one set definition because it can mean so many things to different people. The following are some common definitions:it is the art of writing thoughts, ideas, and dreams into imaginative language which may contain verse, pause, meter, repetition, and/or rhyme.writing that formulates a concentrated imaginative awareness of experience in language chosen and arranged to create a specific emotional response through meaning, sound,and rhythm

• A poet is the one who writes poetry.
• A poem is a written expression of emotion or ideas in an arrangement of words or verse, most often rhythmically.

Different Types of Poetry

• There are over 50 types of poetry.
• Poetry is categorized by:
• the number of lines in the poem, for example, sonnet
• the words in the poem,
• whether it rhymes or not, and
• what it is about, for example, love poetry, death poetry, etc
• Below are the common types of poetry:
• Haikus
• Sonnets
• Name poems
• Free verse poems

Haikus

• The haiku originated from Japan,.
• It’s the shortest type of poem and, often, the most difficult to understand.
• Haiku poems consist of 3 lines. 
• The first and last lines of a Haiku have 5 syllables and the middle line has 7 syllables. 
•  The lines rarely rhyme.

Look at the example below:

Easter Chocolate Haiku

by Kaitlyn Guenther

Easter bunny hides
Easter eggs are out of sight
Kids look everywhere

Free verse poems

• A free verse is the loosest type of poem.
• It can consist of as many lines as the writer wants.
• It can either rhyme or not, and it does not require any fixed metrical pattern.

Look at the example below:

From Marriage
Marianne Moore

This institution,

perhaps one should say enterprise
out of respect for which
one says one need not change one’s mind
about a thing one has believed in,
requiring public promises
of one’s intention
to fulfill a private obligation:
I wonder what Adam and Eve
think of it by this time,
this fire-gilt steel
alive with goldenness;
how bright it shows—

Sonnets

• A sonnet is best described as a lyric poem that consists of fourteen lines.
• Sonnet’s have at least one or two conventional rhyme schemes.

An example of a sonnet is the poem below:

From Visions
Francesco Petrarch

Being one day at my window all alone,

So manie strange things happened me to see,
As much as it grieveth me to thinke thereon.
At my right hand a hynde appear’d to mee,
So faire as mote the greatest god delite;
Two eager dogs did her pursue in chace.
Of which the one was blacke, the other white:
With deadly force so in their cruell race

They pincht the haunches of that gentle beast,

That at the last, and in short time, I spide,
Under a rocke, where she alas, opprest,
Fell to the ground, and there untimely dide.
Cruell death vanquishing so noble beautie
Oft makes me wayle so hard a desire.

Name poems

• They are popular among children and are often used in schools.
• The name of the person becomes the poem.
• Each letter in the name is the first letter in the line of the poem.

Study DUNCAN poem below:

Drew naughty cucumbers frenetically
Umbilical yet chubby
Notified earls generously
Cavorted willfully
Apologized selfishly
Napped frankly but courageously

Note:There is a very wide definition of what constitutes poetry, and although some types of poetry can be grouped together in specific styles, creativity is the key to poetry and a new poet can choose to write in any style he wants, even if it doesn’t fit into one of the recognized types.