Types of Poetry

 Epic  Dirge
 Ballad  Idyll
 Elegy  Sonnet
 Haiku  Limerick
 Ode  Blank Verse
 Free Verse
Epic
 An epic is a long and narrative poem that
normally tells a story about a hero or an
adventure. Epics can be oral stories or can
be poems in written form. The Illiad and
the Odyssey are examples of famous epic
poems, as is The Song of Hiawatha by
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow.
Ballad
 Ballad poems also tell a story, like epic
poems do. However, ballad poetry is often
based on a legend or a folk tale. Ballad
poems may take the form of songs and
may contain a moral or a lesson.
Sonnet
 Sonnets: a 14-line poem with a very
specific rhyme and rhythm format. Sonnets
are written in iambic pentameter.
Shakespearian Sonnet
 Shakespearian sonnets, the most famous of
the sonnets, have 10 syllables to each of
the 14 lines, with a rhyme format of abab,
cdcd, efef, gg.
 The English sonnet has three quatrains
and a final couplet.
Sonnet 18 By William Shakespeare
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.
Cometime 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.
Italian/Petrarchan Sonnet
 Italian sonnet: An octave (eight lines) and
a sestet (six lines); typically rhymed
abbaabba cdecde, it has many variations
that still reflect the basic division into two
parts separated by a rhetorical turn of
argument.
My college life has left me without sleep.
I study every night locked in my room.
The walls at times feel almost like a tomb;
The loneliness doth cause my soul to weep.
Great tears of sadness flow from eyes that keep
Returning to the text where answers loom,
Enshrouded in a chapter like a womb,
My eyes throughout the words do futilely creep.
I must a Big Mac eat or I will die
Of hunger gnawing at my fragile mind
That cannot read another word of this.
I also want a piece of apple pie
That Ronald has so patiently refined.
I must these eat or I will be a mess.
Blank Verse
 Blank Verse is poetry written in
unrhymed iambic pentameter
Haiku
 Haiku is a 3-line verse form.
First & 3rd lines have five
syllables; 2nd has 7.
Topic is always nature
Elegy
• A poem written for someone who has died,
often a tribute. Most are written in formal
writing and a serious tone.
Dirge
 A dirge is a somber song or lament
expressing mourning or grief, such as
would be appropriate for performance at a
funeral.
 A funeral song or tune, or one expressing
mourning in commemoration of the dead.
 Dirge
COME away, come away, death,
And in sad cypres let me be laid;
Fly away, fly away, breath;
I am slain by a fair cruel maid.
My shroud of white, stuck all with yew,
O prepare it!
My part of death, no one so true
Did share it.

Not a flower, not a flower sweet,

On my black coffin let there be strown;
Not a friend, not a friend greet
My poor corse, where my bones shall be thrown:
A thousand thousand sighs to save,
Lay me, O, where
Sad true lover never find my grave
To weep there!
By William Shakespeare
Idyll

 A short poem depicting a rural or pastoral

scene, usually in idealized terms.
 A short poem of a pastoral or rural
character in which something of the
element of landscape is depicted or
suggested.
Idyll by Siegfried Sassoon
In the grey summer garden I shall find you
With day-break and the morning hills behind you.
There will be rain-wet roses; stir of wings;
And down the wood a thrush that wakes and sings.
Not from the past you'll come, but from that deep
Where beauty murmurs to the soul asleep:
And I shall know the sense of life re-born
From dreams into the mystery of morn
Where gloom and brightness meet. And standing there
Till that calm song is done, at last we'll share
The league-spread, quiring symphonies that are
Joy in the world, and peace, and dawn’s one star.

- See more at: http://www.poets.org/viewmedia.php/prmMID/20895#sthash.qh8AAnN8.dpuf

ode
 An ode is a long lyric poem with a serious
subject written in an elevated style.
Famous examples are Wordsworth’s Hymn
to Duty or Keats’ Ode to a Grecian Urn.
Limerick
 A limerick is a short, humorous, often
ribald or nonsense poem, especially one in
five-line anapestic meter with a strict rhyme
scheme (AABBA), which is sometimes
obscene with humorous intent.
 Limerick 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!”
 Rhyme Scheme
Rhyme Scheme- a pattern of rhyme in a poem. For
instance, if there are 4 lines, or a quatrain, and the
first and third lines rhyme, it has the pattern of
a-b-a-b.

If all four lines rhyme with each other, it has the

rhyme scheme of a-a-a-a.

If only the second and fourth lines rhyme, the

pattern is a-b-c-b.
 Lyric Poem

Lyric Poem- a short poem in which a single speaker expresses

personal thoughts and feelings
he Sonnet:

A fourteen-line poem
Expresses author’s feelings
Has a particular end rhyme pattern (ABABCDCD…)
Usually ends in a rhymed couplet (two lines with end rhyme)
Shakespeare wrote over 100 sonnets
Lyric Poetry
 a short poem with one speaker (not necessarily
the poet) who expresses thought and feeling.
Though it is sometimes used only for a brief
poem about feeling (like the sonnet). it is more
often applied to a poem expressing the complex
evolution of thoughts and feeling, such as the
elegy, the dramatic monologue, and the ode.
The emotion is or seems personal In classical
Greece, the lyric was a poem written to be sung,
accompanied by a lyre.
 Rhyme Scheme

Whose woods these are I think I know.

His house is in the village though:
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up the snow.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,

But I have promises to keep.
And miles to go before I sleep.
And miles to go before I sleep.
The Ode:

It’s a lyric poem usually addressed to a

particular person or thing.

It generally deals with one main idea and

can be written as a song of praise or to
celebrate an experience, thing or a person.

Ode to a Fountain Pen:

“Oh beloved pen of
midnight black ink,
How I love to roll
you down my nose.”
 Ode to My Thumb:
“Delicious appendage on my
left hand. You are my favorite
finger, my most tasty dessert.”

Ode to Dancing:

“’Kick up your heels

Wave your hands in the air.
There’s nothing as joyful as
dancing in pairs!”
Ode to My Teeth:
Little white molars
Striped with braces
Help me make
amusing faces
A ballad is a songlike poem that tells a story, often a sad story
of betrayal, death, or loss.
•Ballads usually have a regular, steady rhythm, a simple
rhyme pattern, and a refrain, or a repeated part of a poem, all
of which make them easy to memorize.
•Usually follows a-b-c-b rhyme scheme.
•Historically ballads were passed down orally from person to
person rather than in writing.
Steady rhythm,
simple rhyme pattern,
and refrain.
That’s easy!!
Narrative Poem: Tells a story
Elegy: A poem written for someone who has died, often a
tribute. Most are written in formal writing and a serious tone.
Couplets: two rhyming lines of poetry that are consecutive.
Haiku: consists of 17 unrhymed syllables, organized into three
lines, and doesn’t rhyme:
Line 1: 5 syllables
Line 2: 7 syllables
Line 3: 5 syllables
Most describe nature, a moment of beauty which keeps you
thinking or feeling.
Lymerick: an amusing verse of five lines:

Lines 1, 2, and 5 ryhme and lines 3 and 4 rhyme.

Line 5 refers to line 1
Lines 3 and 4 are usually shorter than the other lines.
The rhyming pattern is AABBA

EX: There once was a musical king

Who suddenly started to sing.
The birds of the sky
All started to fly
Right over that talented king
Concrete Poem: a poem that creates a picture

Acrostic poem: a poem that is vertical and spells out a word

and usually describes that word.

Ex:

A: antsy
M: merry
Y: young
An epic is a long narrative poem about the
many deeds of a great hero.
•Closely connected to a particular culture. The hero
of an epic embodies the important values of the
society he comes from.
•Essentially, an epic is a long story about the
quests of a hero.
•Think Hercules, and Shrek in poetic form.