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poetry
The imaginative expression of emotion, thought, or narrative, frequently in metrical form and often using figurative language. Poetry has traditionally been distinguished from prose (ordinary written language) by rhyme or the rhythmical arrangement of words (metre), the employment of the line as a formal unit, heightened vocabulary, and freedom of syntax. Poetic images are presented using a variety of techniques, of which the most universal is the use of metaphor and simile to evoke a range of associations through implicit or explicit comparison. Although not frequently encountered in modern verse, alliteration has been used, chiefly for rhetoric or emphasis, in works dating back to Old English. A distinction is made between lyrical, or songlike, poetry (sonnet, ode, elegy, pastoral), and narrative, or story-telling, poetry (ballad, lay, epic). Classical poetry is considered lyrical or narrative according to the degree to which the poet's voice is heard. Poetry is an ancient medium of expression; originally an oral tradition, it was formulated in non-literate societies and imbued with cultural significance as it was transmitted and preserved by generations of bards. Poetry cannot be divorced from the speaking voice and there are many formal patterns available to the poet, from blank verse to the rhymed four-line stanza, as well as techniques such as onomatopoeia, by means of which the poet can select and arrange language to create a specific emotional response through sound and rhythm. The written form does, however, provide an additional aesthetic contribution to the poem in the grouping of lines on a page, even into a visual pattern, as in George Herbert's Easter Wings. There is a sense in which poetry will always be artificial to some extent; concentration of special linguistic effects in a regular pattern will tend to produce a somewhat calculated impression. Even with the 20th-century demand for poetry written in ordinary, accessible language, encouraged by poets such as W H Auden and Cecil Day Lewis, poetry can appear deliberate, mannered, and removed from everyday usage. This may explain why, traditionally, poetry has been considered a higher form of expression than prose. In modern times, the distinction is not always clear cut. If prose displays rhythm and other features associated with poetry, it is sometimes termed prose poetry. Much of Virginia Woolf's work, for example, could be placed in this category. Poetic form has been used as a vehicle for satire, parody, and expositions of philosophical, religious, and practical subjects. But one of the essential characteristics of poetry is its ability to appeal to the sense as well as Bollingen Prize

American Verse Project Burning Press 'Modern British Poetry' Poetry Zone

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the intellect. "Idly inquisitive tribe of grammarians, / who dig up the poetry of others / by the roots ... Get away, bugs, / that bite secretly at the eloquent." Antiphanes Greek comic poet.
[Greek Anthology]

"The Fleshly School of Poetry." Robert Williams Buchanan English poet, playwright, and novelist.
[Article title]

"She that with poetry is won, / Is but a desk to write upon." Samuel Butler English poet.
[Hudibras pt II]

"Who killed John Keats? / 'I,' says the Quarterly, / So savage and Tartarly; / ''Twas one of my feats.'" George Byron English poet.
['John Keats']

"I wish our clever young poets would remember my homely definitions of prose and poetry; that is, prose = words in their best order; poetry = the best words in the best order." Samuel Coleridge English poet.
[Table Talk 12 July 1827]

"I hardly ever tire of love or rhyme / That's why I'm poor and have a rotten time." Wendy Cope English poet.
[Serious Concerns, 'Variation on Belloc's Fatigue']

"My Mind to Me a Kingdom Is." Edward Dyer English poet.

[Title of poem]

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"No one is so completely disenchanted with the world, or knows it so thoroughly, or is so utterly disgusted with it, that when it begins to smile upon him he does not become partially reconciled to it." Leopardi Giacomo Italian romantic poet.
[Pensieri]

"If poetry comes not as naturally as leaves to a tree it had better not come at all." John Keats English poet.
[Letter to John Taylor 27 February 1818]

"We hate poetry that has a palpable design upon us ... Poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle or amaze it with itself, but with its subject." John Keats English poet.
[Letter to J H Reynolds 3 February 1818]

"Blest pair of Sirens, pledges of Heaven's joy, / Sphereborn harmonious sisters, Voice and Verse." John Milton English poet.
['At a Solemn Music']

"He knew / Himself to sing, and build the lofty rhyme." John Milton English poet.
[Lycidas l. 10]

"The poet begins where the man ends. The man's lot is to live his human life, the poet's to invent what is nonexistent." Jos Ortega y Gasset Spanish philosopher and critic.
[Dehumanization of Art]

"Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal [but] which the reader recognizes as his own." Salvatore Quasimodo

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Italian poet.
[Speech 1960]

"Poetry is the opening and closing of a door, leaving those who look through to guess about what is seen during a moment." Carl Sandburg US poet.
['Poetry Considered']

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