POETIC DEVICES

Poetic device Definition Example

Alliteration Repetition of a letter “Sudden successive flights of
in a group or words bullets streak the silence”
aaa close together.

Poetic device Definition Example

Assonance Repetition of a “Keep your head down and
vowel sound. stay in doors –

aeiou we’ve lost this war before it

has begun.”

Poetic device Definition Example

Onomatopoeia Using words to “when miners roared past in
describe or imitate lorries”
sound.

Poetic device Definition Example

Repetition The purposeful re- “I hate that drum’s
use of words and discordant sound,
Parading round, and round,
phrases.
and round”

Poetic device Definition Example

Rhyme The use of words “And will you succeed?
with matching Yes! You will, indeed!
sounds. Can be in (98 and ¾ percent
guaranteed.)”
the middle or at
ends of lines.

Poetic device Definition Example

Rhythm The pace or beat “You’re on your own.
of the poem - can
And you know what you
vary from line to know.
line. And YOU are the guy who’ll
decide where to go.”

Poetic device Definition Example

Imagery Words that appeal “Less deadly than the air
to the senses and that shudders black with
snow,”
help us picture

Miss Dillon
 .
Poetic device Definition Example
Simile A comparison “The rain poured over the
between two window like someone had
‘like’ ‘as’ unlike things using turned on a garden hose”.
like or as.
Poetic device Definition Example
Metaphor A comparison “I couldn’t believe what was
saying something happening to me as they

‘is’ is something else. opened the cell. This is hell.”

Poetic device Definition Example

Personification Giving human “and the storm continued to
qualities or scream and bash down the
doors”.
characteristics to
animals or objects.

Poetic device Definition Example

Emotive language Words and phrases “mangled limbs, and dying
that cause an groans,
And widows’ tears, and
emotional
orphans’ moans”
response in
the reader.
Poetic device Definition Example
Couplet A pair of lines, “Bread pudding is wet nelly
usually rhymed And me stomach is me belly”

Poetic device Definition Example

Enjambment A line ending in “the danger of the mission
which the syntax, still around them
and night falling, its silver
rhythm and
stars just like the ones
thought are you got for remembering
continued into the your Bible texts.”
next line.

Miss Dillon