Sound Effects in Poetry

What is poetry?

Poetry is a kind of rhythmic, compressed language that uses figures of speech and imagery to appeal to emotion and imagination.

Written in lines (a row of words not necessarily sentences) and stanzas (a group of lines).

End Rhyme

Rhymes made by pairing the last word in one line with the last word in another line.

Example: Did you hear about the rose that grew from a crack in the concrete?Proving nature’s law is wrong, it learned to walk without having feet.

-Tupac Shakur, from “Concrete Rose”

Internal Rhyme

Rhymes formed by echoing the last word in a line by placing it at the beginning or in the middle of the following line.

Example:And out of the houses the rats came tumbling;Great rats, small rats, lean rats, brawny rats,Brown rats, black rats, gray rats, tawny rats,

-Robert Browning, from “The Pied Piper of Hamelin”

Rhyme Scheme

The pattern of rhyming sounds at the ends of lines in a poem.

To find a poem’s rhyme scheme, mark the first line of the poem and all of the lines that rhyme with it with a a; mark the second line of the poem and all of the lines that rhyme with it with a b; and so on.

Rhyme Scheme Example

Now the Star-belly SneetchesHad bellies with starsThe Plain-belly SneetchesHad none upon thars.

What is the rhyme scheme?

Alliteration

The repetition of a single consonant sound in words that are close together.

Example: Peter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppers

Onomatopoeia

The use of a word whose sound imitates or suggests its meaning.

Example:Our washing machine went whisity whirrWhisity whisity whisity whirrOne day at noon it went whisity clickWhisity whisity whisity clickclick grr click grr click grr click

Call the repairmanFix it…quick

-Patricia Hubbell