POETRY

the arrangement of lines in which the form and content fuse to suggest meanings beyond the literal meaning of the words; the language of poetry is more compressed and musical. It has Rhyme, rhythm and meter.

What is a poem? Looks different from prose on a printed page. When it is read aloud, as it is meant to be, it sounds different from and more memorable than prose. Because it tries to say so much in so compact form, the meaning it imparts seems to be more complex and more difficult to grasp than what we usually find in prose narratives and essays. This last characteristic makes it intimidating for the students which should not be the case because the language that poetry uses is no different in prose. Also, many of the features of language that we usually consider to be as attributes of poetry like rhyme, rhythm, figurative language, and imagery are also found in prose as well. In poetry, however, they are made to count for more, to carry more meanings. Every poem is an expression of human sentiment sometimes happy, sometimes sad, sometimes bitter, and sometimes casual. Since the poem is an utterance it always has a speaker and some provocation of the utterance. Usually it has a listener, too, his presence at least implied. In a sense, therefore, a poem is like fiction and drama it has a story to tell. How effective a poem is depends upon the way the poet handled the elements of language, sound, sense, and structure to convey meaning.

Elements of poetry:

Sense

A word is a sound or combination of sounds which refers to or means something. A word can be used in different senses, but for each sense the word refers to an object, idea, action, or quality. This meaning is called denotation of the word. But sometimes a word may call to mind other allied meanings or ideas. We call these meanings as connotations. A poet capitalizes on this tendency of words to acquire cluster of associations and suggestions from the contexts in which they are used, for he knows that the nuances of the associated meanings are what he needs to convey his message in the most economical way. A poet also makes use of allusions, or references to some place, person, event object, or quotations supposed to be familiar to everyone to convey meaning. Aside from being suggestive, the language of poetry is also vivid. To recreate experience or present ideas, attitudes and feelings, the poet usually uses expressions that appeal to the sense of mind which are analogous to our physical senses. The images he creates are visual, aural, olfactory, gustatory, tactile, thermal and kinesthetic. These are pictures that through vividness and compression imply comparisons that are more effective than direct statements. The creation of mental images usually involves the use of figurative speech . simile, metaphor, personification, apostrophe, metonymy, hyperbole etc.. The figure of speeches used must be effective, must be apt, fresh, natural and appropriate to the whole poem.

Structure

In poetry, we must not just know the meanings of the words but also know how the words fit together. In other words, crucial to the understanding of poetry is knowing the established rules of grammar of the language used. We must also understand the relationship of the words.

Sound The meaning of a poem is carried by the sound of the words used. The pronunciation of words: soft and easy, continuous, stops and abrupt end. Poetry is like ordinary speech. When we utter sounds of human speech, they do not come out in one even flow but in varying pitches, stresses, volumes, and durations. While this is present in prose, it is more obvious in poetry where it is used with a special intensity to stress certain moods and feelings, certain ideas and ideas. To sum up, a poem becomes an effective conveyor of meaning it its components substance or sense, sound, and structure they must work together to make a whole meaningful entity.