POETRYPART 1

Poetry and music

In the beginning, poetry was recited or sung while strumming a lyre

A lyre was an instrument like a small harp that a person could hold in their arms.

Reciting poetry to music helped poets memorize epic (long) poems

Alkman

Alkman lived in the Greek city-state of Sparta in the 7th century.

His is the first known poetry to be written down apart from music

Alkman

Alkman’s poetry is full of nature imagery and specific detail

Often dealt with military courage and graphic depictions of war.

Alkman

Asleep in the mountains are the peaks and gullies, the slopes and ravines. Asleep the crawling creatures of dark earth, mountain-laired beasts, the tribe of bees, and the monsters in the depths of the purple sea. Asleep the flocks of broad-winged birds.

Other early poets

Sappho: born between 630 and 612 BCEmost poems centered on passion and love

exiled to Sicily

clarity of language and simplicity of thought characterized her poetry

Homer:lived in the 7th or 8th century BCEgreatest of Greek epic poetsauthored The Illiad and The Odyssey

Samples

Iridescent-throned Aphrodite, deathless Child of Zeus, wile-weaver, I now implore you, Don't--I beg you, Lady--with pains and torments Crush down my spirit,

But before if ever you've heard my pleadings Then return, as once when you left your father'sGolden house; you yoked to your shining car yourWing-whirring sparrows;

Skimming down the paths of the sky's bright ether On they brought you over the earth's black bosom, Swiftly--then you stood with a sudden brilliance, Goddess, before me;

Sappho: Hymn to AphroditeHomer: The Odyssey

Tell me, O muse, of that ingenious hero who travelled far and wide after he had sacked the famous town of Troy. Many cities did he visit, and many were the nations with whose manners and customs he was acquainted; moreover he suffered much by sea while trying to save his own life and bring his men safely home; but do what he might he could not save his men, for they perished through their own sheer folly in eating the cattle of the Sun-god Hyperion; so the god prevented them from ever reaching home. Tell me, too, about all these things, O daughter of Jove, from whatsoever source you may know them.

Terms

stanza: a grouping of two or more lines of verse (like a paragraph in prose writing)

rhyme: the repetition of the same soundimagery: a mental picturesymbol: a word or image that stands for

or represents something elserefrain: repetition of one or more

phrases or lines in a poem

Other termsmetaphor: a comparison of usually unlike objects

EX: Melba is a frantic poodle when she dances.

simile: a comparison of usually unlike objects using “like” or “as” to say something is similar

EX: Melba danced like a frantic poodle.

cliché: an overused, worn out word or phraseEX: He was barking up the wrong tree.

Mr. Peel is such an awesome teacher.

Techniques: Alliterationrepetition of the first letter or sound in two or more words

Lenny licked the lollipopPeter Piper picked a peck of pickled peppersPeel’s purgative papillary policies

Techniques: Assonancethe repetition of vowel sounds

They eat beans mostly, this old yellow pair.Dinner is a casual affair.Plain chipware on a plain and creaking wood, Tin flatware.

Two who are Mostly Good.Two who have lived their day,But keep on putting on their clothesAnd putting things away.

And remembering . . .Remembering, with twinklings and twinges,As they lean over the beans in their rented back room thatis full of beads and receipts and dolls and cloths,tobacco crumbs, vases and fringes.

Gwendolyn Brooks

Techniques: Internal Rhymerhyming that occurs inside of a single line

I bring fresh showers for the thirsting flowers, From the seas and the streams;

I bear light shade for the leaves when laid In their noon-day dreams.

From my wings are shaken the dews that waken The sweet buds every one,

When rocked to rest on their mother's breast, As she dances about the Sun.

I wield the flail of the lashing hail, And whiten the green plains under,

And then again I dissolve it in rain, And laugh as I pass in thunder.

Percy B. Shelley: The Cloud

Ways to keep the music in the words: meter

syllables: exhaled breaths of soundstressed (strong) syllables: syllables

that are emphasized by a heightening of the voice

unstressed (weak) syllables: syllables that are not emphasized, or that remain flat.

ba NA na BASE ball

Ways to keep the music in the words: meter

meter: the arrangement of syllables in a noticeable pattern to give rhythm to the lines

Just SIT right BACK and HEAR a TALE, a TALE of a FATEful TRIP

That STARTed FROM this TROPic PORT aBOARD this TIny SHIP

Iambic pentameter

iambic meter: a pattern of weak syllables followed by strong ones

weak STRONG weak STRONG weak STRONG

poetic foot: a unit of measurement – one poetic foot is a weak syllable paired with a strong one

iambic pentameter: a meter (or rhythm) that is iambic and has five poetic feet per line

Assignment

Your task:

Write six lines of perfect iambic pentameter

Be prepared to read one line to the class