PoetryFrom Wikipedia, the free encyclopediaThis article is about the art form. For other uses, see Poetry (disambiguation)."Poem", "Poems", and "Poetic" redirect here. For other uses, see Poem (disambiguation), Poems (disambiguation), and Poetic (disambiguation).Poetry is a form of literature that uses aesthetic and rhythmic[!["![#! $ualities of language%such as phonaesthetics, sound symbolism, and metre%to e&oke meanings in addition to, or in place of, the prosaic ostensible meaning.Poetry has a long history, dating back to the 'umerian Epic of Gilgamesh. (arly poems e&ol&ed from folk songs such as the )hinese Shijing, or from a need to retell oral epics, as *ith the 'anskrit Vedas, +oroastrian Gathas, and the ,omeric epics, the Iliad and the Odyssey. -ncient attempts to define poetry, such as -ristotle.s Poetics, focused on the uses of speech in rhetoric, drama, song and comedy. /ater attempts concentrated on features such as repetition, &erse form and rhyme, and emphasi0ed the aesthetics *hich distinguish poetry from more ob1ecti&ely informati&e, prosaic forms of *riting. From the mid2"3th century, poetry has sometimes been more generally regarded as a fundamental creati&e act employing language.Poetry uses forms and con&entions to suggest differential interpretation to *ords, or to e&oke emoti&e responses. 4e&ices such as assonance, alliteration, onomatopoeia and rhythm are sometimes used to achie&e musical or incantatory effects. The use of ambiguity, symbolism, irony and other stylistic elements of poetic diction often lea&es a poem open to multiple interpretations. 'imilarly figures of speech such as metaphor, simile and metonymy [5! create a resonance bet*een other*ise disparate images%a layering of meanings, forming connections pre&iously not percei&ed. 6indred forms of resonance may e7ist, bet*een indi&idual &erses, in their patterns of rhyme or rhythm.'ome poetry types are specific to particular cultures and genres and respond to characteristics of the language in *hich the poet *rites. 8eaders accustomed to identifying poetry *ith 4ante, 9oethe, :ickie*ic0 and 8umi may think of it as *ritten in lines based on rhyme and regular meter; there are, ho*e&er, traditions, such as ![?! @n today.s increasingly globali0ed *orld, poets often adapt forms, styles and techni$ues from di&erse cultures and languages.