1. What are the Poetic Devices?
Slide Show Created By:
Paula Trapani
LRMS Librarian

2. The mental pictures created by a piece of writing
Imagery
The mental pictures created by a piece of writing
Example:
Folks sway in the
Palace aisles
grinning and stomping and
out of breath,
From Out of the Dust
p , “On Stage”

3. Simile Right hand playing notes sharp as tongues,
A phrase that compares two
things using “like” or “as”
Example:
Right hand
playing notes sharp as tongues,
From Out of the Dust
p , “On Stage”

4. A phrase that compares two things without using “like” or “as”
Metaphor
A phrase that compares two
things without using “like” or “as”
Example:
That is
heaven How supremely
heaven
playing piano
can be.
From Out of the Dust
p , “On Stage”

5. Personification
When human traits or characteristics are given to inanimate objects or abstract notions
Example:
When I point my fingers at the keys,
the music
springs straight out of me.
From Out of the Dust
p , “On Stage”

6. Words at the end of lines of poetry
Rhyme
Words at the end of lines of poetry
that sound the same.
Example:
A Student's Prayer by Anonymous
Now I lay me down to rest. I pray I pass tomorrow's test. If I should die before I wake, that's one less test I'll have to take.

7. The repetition of the first consonant sound in a group of words
Alliteration
The repetition of the first consonant sound in a group of words
Example:
If Ma could put her arm across my shoulder
sometime,
or stroke back my hair
or sing me to sleep, making the soft sounds,
the reassuring noises,
that no matter how brittle and sharp life seemed,
no matter how brittle and sharp she seemed,
she was still my ma who loved me…
From Out of the Dust (p. 148, “Motherless”)

8. The repetition of vowel sounds in a group of words.
Assonance
The repetition of vowel sounds in a group of words.
Example:
“…the rare and radiant maiden whom the angels named Lenore…”
From “The Raven”
by Edgar Allen Poe

9. Hyperbole
A figure of speech involving exaggeration to help create a desired image.
Example:
Why does a boy who’s fast as a jet
Take all day—and sometimes two—
To get to school?
By: John Ciardi (from “Speed Adjustments”)

10. Idiom
A phrase or expression that means something different from what the words actually say. (Usually only understandable to a particular group of people.)
Examples:
Raining cats and dogs
Teach an old dog new tricks
Skating on thin ice
A day late and a dollar short
Air your dirty laundry in public

11. Onomatopoeia
Use of a word that is an actual imitation of the sound it is referring to
Example:
Swoosh, swish
paddling down a creek
splish, splash, whump
a fish jumps on me
By: Lacey
(a student at Langley Meadows school in Canada)