POETRY HOW-TOS:A TUTORIAL ON CONCRETE POEMS AND COUPLETS

WHAT IS ?

Dictionary.com defines poetry as, “The art of rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative, or elevated thoughts.”

Poetry comes in many forms Concrete poetry and the couplet are two very

different forms of poetry.

CONCRETE POETRY What is it?

According to PoemofQuotes, a concrete poem “uses typographical arrangements to display an element of the poem. This can either be through re-arrangement of letters of a word or by arranging the words as a shape.”

CONCRETE POETRY

In a concrete poem, the words form a shape that represents the main idea of the poem.

Before reading this poem (right), the reader can tell what the main idea of the poem is by the shape the words form…

THE STEPS TO CREATING A CONCRETE POEM

Step 1…Decide on a topic. Make sure the topic is one that can be

represented with an image. For example, rainbows.

Step 2…Write the poem. The words in a concrete poem can rhyme, but do

not have to. Remember, the longer the poem, the more words you’ll have to fit into your image.

Step 3…Choose the image you would like to represent your poem. For example, the image that will represent a

poem about rainbows is a rainbow.

CREATING A CONCRETE POEM (CONTINUED)

Step 4…Create the image with words. The image can be drawn first and the words

added after, or the words can simply form the image…

THE COUPLET

What is it? According to PoemofQuotes, “A couplet has

rhyming stanzas made up of two lines.”

The dog was much too fat.He couldn’t catch the cat.

CLICK

THE COUPLET

• A couplet can be composed of two lines, or multiple lines.

• In a multiple-line couplet, every two lines must rhyme.

Goose and Moose

It's hard to tell just what a goosewill have in common with a moose.Or better yet, just what three geese

will have in common with three meese.(Is that the plural for a mouse?

Is grice the plural for three grouse?)I'll say this once, I'll say this thrice,

the plural for a moose is mice,or plural for three mice is meeses.

I think that I may fall to pieces.I feel my dizzy state increase

about the mice, the grice and geese.

by Denise RodgersCopyright© Denise Rodgers

THE STEPS TO CREATING A COUPLET

Step 1…Decide on a topic. Step 2…Write the first line of the poem.

Make sure the last word in the line can be made into a rhyming word…For example, do not use a word such as orange…

Step 3…Write the second line of the poem. The last word of the second line must rhyme with

the last word of the first line.

REMEMBER…

The key to good poetry of any type is creativity and imagination!

REFERENCES

55 Types of Poetry. (2011). Retrieved July 7, 2011 from http://www.poemofquotes.com/articles/poetry_for

ms.php Couplet Poems and Couplet Poetry. (2011).

Retrieved July 7, 2011 from http://www.funny-poems-for-free.com/couplet-po

ems.html Poetry. (2011). Retrieved July 7, 2011 from

http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/poetry