1. Forms of Poetry
April 10th, 2017

2. Narrative Poetry

3. Narrative Poetry Example:
The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the Mudville nine that day: The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play, And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same, A pall-like silence fell upon the patrons of the game.
(Casey at the Bat by Ernest Lawrence Thayer)
Narrative poetry tells a story in verse. They often have elements similar to those in short stories, such as plot and characters.

4. Free Verse Poetry

5. Free Verse Poetry Example:
The fog comes
on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.
(Fog by Carl Sandburg)
Free verse poetry is defined by its lack of structure. It has no regular rhyme, line length, or stanza pattern.

6. Lyric Poetry

7. Lyric Poetry
Example:
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.
(Sonnet 18 by William Shakespeare)
Lyric poetry expresses the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker, often in highly musical verse.

8. Concrete Poems

9. Concrete Poetry Example:
Concrete poems are shaped to look like their subjects. The poet arranges the lines to create a picture on the page.

10. Haiku

11. Haiku
Example:
It’s cold—and I wait
For someone to shelter me
And take me from here.
(Richard Wright)
Haiku is a three-line Japanese verse form. The first and third lines each have five syllables and the second line has seven.

12. Limerick Poetry

13. Limerick Poetry Example:
There was an Old Man with a beard
Who said, 'It is just as I feared!
Two Owls and a Hen,
Four Larks and a Wren,
Have all built their nests in my beard!’
(Edward Lear)
Limerick poetry is a five- lined poem with a highly rhythmic pattern. The rhyme scheme is AABBA.