Poems

Poems are literary works composed in lines and sometimes stanzas that aim to express experiences, emotions, or ideas with heightened attention to sound, rhythm, image, and meaning. Poems often employ condensed language and structured or intentional line breaks to influence pace and emphasis, distinguishing them from prose.

Poetry has ancient roots in oral and written traditions worldwide. In many cultures, poetry accompanied song, ritual, or storytelling. Major forms include lyric poetry, which expresses personal feeling; narrative poetry, which tells a story; epic poetry, a long narrative often about heroic deeds; and dramatic poetry, written for performance. Prominent forms include the sonnet, haiku, villanelle, ballad, and ode. Free verse, lacking consistent meter or rhyme, emerged as a dominant mode in modern poetry.

Techniques: meter and rhyme provide rhythmic structure; imagery uses sensory details; figures of speech such as metaphor and simile; symbol, tone, mood, and voice; sound devices like alliteration, assonance, consonance, and enjambment.

Forms vary by tradition: the English sonnet typically 14 lines; the haiku uses a 5-7-5 syllable count; villanelle relies on repeating refrains; ballads combine narrative with chorus-like lines; odes address subjects with praise. Poems are often published in anthologies, journals, and books, and are studied in schools; they are also performed in spoken-word and slam contexts.

Translations and digital media broaden accessibility; poets may work in multilingual settings; poetry can intersect with other arts such as music and visual art.