Poetic Devices Examples

Identify the type of figurative language being used below-

I have died everyday, waiting for you

Darling, don't be afraid, I have loved you for a thousand years

I'll love you for a thousand more

• metaphor

• hyperbole

• simile

• a thousand years

Identify the figurative language being used here.

How many times do I have to tell you

Even when you’re crying you’re beautiful too

The world is beating you down, I’m around through every move

-John Legend, "All of Me"

• Personification

• Repetition

• Simile

• Alliteration

Do you ever feel like a plastic bag

Drifting through the wind, wanting to start again?

Do you ever feel, feel so paper thin

Like a house of cards, one blow from caving in?

-"Firework", Katy Perry

• Simile

• Metaphor

• Onomatopoeia

• Personification

I feel glorious, glorious

Got a chance to start again

I was born for this, born for this

It's who I am, how could I forget?

-Macklemore, "Glorious"

• Repetition

• Imagery

• Rhyme

• Metaphor

I like that boom boom pow

Them chickens jackin' my style

-The Black Eyed Peas, "Boom Boom Pow"

• Onomatopoeia

• Imagery

• Simile

• Assonance

Hey, diddle, diddle,

The cat and the fiddle,

The cow jumped over the moon;

The little dog laughed

To see such sport,

And the dish ran away with the spoon.

-"Hey Diddle, Diddle" nursery rhyme

• Alliteration

• Symbolism

• Metaphor

• Personification

Last night, while I lay thinking here,

Some Whatifs crawled inside my ear

And pranced and partied all night long

And sang their same old Whatif song:

Whatif I’m dumb in school?

Whatif they’ve closed the swimming pol?

Whatif I get beat up?

Whatif there’s poison in my cup?

Whatif I start to cry?

-"Whatif" by Shel Silverstein

• Onomatopoeia and Personification

• Personification

• Metaphor

• Personification and Repetition

I turned my collar to the cold and damp

When my eyes were stabbed by the flash of a neon light

That split the night

And touched the sound of silence

-"The Sound of Silence", Simon and Garfunkel

• Hyperbole

• Repetition

• Simile

• Onomatopoeia

You're a mean one, Mr. Grinch

You really are a heel

You're as cuddly as a cactus

You're as charming as an eel

-"You're a Mean One, Mr. Grinch"

• Simile and personification

• Metaphor and symbolism

• Hyperbole and imagery

• Simile and Metaphor

I shall be telling this with a sigh

Somewhere ages and ages hence:

Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—

I took the one less traveled by,

And that has made all the difference.

"The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost

• Symbol

• Alliteration

• Simile

• Hyperbole