Lesson Topic 2: Elementary Elements of Structure and Rhyme

Poetic Structure

An illustration of the classic children's nursery rhyme "Humpty Dumpty." Humpty Dumpty, the egg, sits on a wall. Different types of poems have varying formations. Oftentimes, poems have different stanzas. Stanzas are groups of lines in a poem, and they are similar to paragraphs you would see in a paper. Sometimes poems will have refrain stanzas. A refrain is a repeated line or number of lines in a poem or song, typically at the end of each verse. Refrains in a poem are like the chorus of a song—they are repeated every so often.

Rhyme and Rhythm

Rhyming occurs when a line, syllable, or word has or ends with a sound that corresponds to one another. For example, the waves crash upon the beach just far enough for the water to reach. "Beach" and "reach" rhyme. Alliteration is often considered to be a type of rhyme. The repetition of initial consonant sounds creates alliteration. For example, "Sally sells seashells by the seashore" contains alliteration due to the repeating consonant "s" throughout the line.

When rhyme appears in a poem, sometimes, a rhyme scheme develops. Rhyme scheme is the pattern of rhyme. The traditional way to mark these patterns of rhyme is to assign a letter of the alphabet to each rhyming sound at the end of each line.

For example, read this nursery rhyme poem:

Humpty Dumpty sat on a wall,
Humpty Dumpty had a great fall.
All the king's horses and all the king's men
Couldn't put Humpty together again.

Each line that rhymes with each other receives the same letter of the alphabet starting with "A." The first line ending with "wall" receives the letter "A." Any other line that rhymes with the first line also receives an "A." Therefore, the second line receives an "A" because it ends with "fall" which rhymes with "wall." The third line ends with "men," and "men" does not rhyme with "wall." So, the third line receives a "B." The last line rhymes with the third line, so the last line also receives a "B." Overall, the rhyme scheme of this stanza is AABB.

Various types of rhyme can create the rhythm in poetry. Just like the rhythm of music, poetry contains rhythm. Rhythm is varying speed, loudness, pitch, elevation, intensity, and expressiveness of speech, especially poetry.

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