1. Traditional and Inventive Forms of Poetry In Preparation for Mrs. Rogers’ Poetry Project!!

2. Traditional Poetry Poetry has been around for centuries, beginning with bards and messengers who used poems to pass along news, songs, and stories. Today, we find poetry in songs, on greeting cards, and in reading anthologies.

3. Ballad a ballad is a poem that tells a story. Ballads are usually written in four-line stanzas called quatrains. Often the first and third lines have four accented syllables; the second and fourth lines have three. Example from “The Enchanted Shirt” by John Hay The King was sick. His cheek was red And his eye was clear and bright; He ate and drank with kingly zest, And peacefully snored at night.

4. Blank Verse Blank verse is unrhymed poetry with meter. The lines in blank verse are 10 syllables in length. Every other syllable, beginning with the second syllable is accented. (note: not every line will have exactly 10 syllables.) an excerpt from “Birches” by Robert Frost When I see birches bend to left and right Across the lines of straighter darker trees I like to think some boy’s been swinging them.

5. Cinquain Cinquain poems are five lines in length. There are syllable cinquains and word cinquains. Word Cinquain Line 1: Title= One Word Line 2: Description of Title=Two Words Line 3: Action about the Title=Three Words Line 4: Feeling about the Title=Four Words Line 5: Synonym for the Title=One Word Syllable Cinquain Line 1: Title= Two Syllables Line 2: Description of Title=Four Syllables Line 3: Action about the Title=Six Syllables Line 4: Feeling about the Title=Eight Syllables Line 5: Synonym for the Title=Two Syllables

6. Couplet A Couplet is two lines of verse that usually rhyme and have one complete idea. My brother can really be a pest He was so cute when he was a baby, who would have guessed?

7. Elegy An Elegy is a poem that states the poet’s sadness about the death of an important person. O CAPTAIN! MY CAPTAIN! Walt Whitman (1819-1892) O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, The ship has weathered every rack, the prize we sought is won, The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring; But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead.

8. Epic An Epic is a long story poem that describes the adventures of a hero. –“The Odyssey” by Homer is a famous epic about the Greek Odyessus. see pages 1102-1162 of your literature for an excerpt of this epic poem.

9. Free Verse Free Verse is poetry that does not require meter or a rhyme scheme. Mirror, Mirror My game face is blue. I must put it back on, see How much of my glory was real And how much fever. I see drawn eyes, too much marring, A suit of swan feathers Without the matching shape. And however I imagine lights, No straw spins to gold. I see as I have been seen, Not radiant, but ashine in hope Yet to see a finish. Copyright © 1998 by Katherine Foreman.

10. Haiku Haiku is a type of Japanese poetry that presents a picture of nature. A haiku poem is three lines in length. The first line is five syllables; the second is seven; and the third is five. Like a bad landscape with neither depth nor feeling; the world through one eye -Derek Lam

11. Limerick A Limerick is a humorous verse of five lines. Lines one, two and five rhyme, as do lines three and four. Lines one, two and five have three stressed syllables; lines three and four have two. There once was a panda named Lu Who always ate crunchy bamboo. He ate all day long, Till he looked like King Kong. Now the zoo doesn’t know what to do. -Sarah Diot

12. Lyric A Lyric is a short poem that expresses personal feelings. My Heart Leaps Up When I Behold (first five lines) My heart leaps up when I behold A rainbow in the sky; So it was when my life began; So it is now I am a man; So be it when I shall grow old. -William Wordsworth

13. Ode An Ode is a long lyric that is deep in feeling and rich in poetic devices and imagery. “Ode on a Grecian Urn” (1 st stanza) Thou still unravish'd bride of quietness, Thou foster-child of silence and slow time, Sylvan historian, who canst thus express A flowery tale more sweetly than our rhyme: What leaf-fring'd legend haunt about thy shape Of deities or mortals, or of both, In Tempe or the dales of Arcady? What men or gods are these? What maidens loth? What mad pursuit? What struggle to escape? What pipes and timbrels? What wild ecstasy? -John Keats

14. Sonnet A Sonnet is a fourteen-line poem that states a poet’s personal feelings. The Shakespearean sonnet follows the abab/cdcd/efef/gg rhyme scheme. Each line is 10 syllables in length, and every other syllable is stressed, beginning with the second syllable. Shall I compare thee to a summer's day? Thou art more lovely and more temperate: Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May, And summer's lease hath all too short a date: Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines, And often is his gold complexion dimmed, And every fair from fair sometime declines, By chance, or nature's changing course untrimmed: But thy eternal summer shall not fade, Nor lose possession of that fair thou ow'st, Nor shall death brag thou wand'rest in his shade, When in eternal lines to time thou grow'st, So long as men can breathe or eyes can see, So long lives this, and this gives life to thee.

15. Invented Forms of Poetry Invented forms of poetry use creative wordplay to express ideas.

16. Alphabet Poetry A form of poetry that states a creative or humorous idea using part of the alphabet. Hot dogs on buns. I love them! Just drizzle with a little Ketchup, and they’ve Left for My tummy!

17. Clerihew Poetry A form of humorous or light verse created by Edmund Clerihew Bentley. A Clerihew poem consists of two rhyming couplets. The name of some well-known person creates one of the rhymes. Edmund Clerihew Bentley Brooded intently On many a foible He thus made enjoyable.

18. Concrete Poetry A form of poetry in which the shape or design helps express the meaning or feeling of the poem.

19. Contrast Couplet a couplet in which the first line includes two words that are opposites. The second line makes a comment about the first. Some hours are too short, and some are too long. I wonder who it was that made the clocks all wrong.

20. Definition Poetry Poetry that defines a word or idea creatively. Temptation- the modern pied piper, calling, willing, drawing the soul resisting, the brain relenting.

21. List Poetry A form of poetry that lists words or phrases. There are rooms to start up in rooms to start out in rooms to start over in rooms to lie in rooms to lie about in rooms to lay away in...

22. Name/Acrostic Poetry A form of poetry in which the letters of a name or word are used to begin each line in the poem. Amazing Silly Happy Loud Even though she’s only two, she can still say “I love You!”

23. Phrase Poetry A form of poetry that states an idea with a list of phrases. Across the icy, frozen pond On a turn On a jump Into the air Down again For the win With a radiant smile.

24. Terse Verse A form of humorous verse made up of two words that rhyme and have the same number of syllables. Clock PoemWilted FlowerTardy Visitor TimeFloppyLate RhymePoppyDate