Rhyme Glossary

Full or perfect rhyme – two or more words or phrases share the same last stressed vowel and all sounds following that vowel example: TOWel / VOWel, aBOARD / igNORED

Masculine rhyme – if the last stressed vowel is the last syllable (so both halves of the rhyme pair are stressed (accented) syllable example: aRISE / surPRISE

Feminine rhyme – if the last stressed vowel is followed by one or more unstressed syllables example: RAPidly / VApidly

Slant (or half) rhyme – either the stressed vowel or the sounds following it differ and don’t match

Eg: BITE / FIRE (only the long i sound, the stressed vowel, matches; consonants differ)

COURage/BUNKer (only match is the UR sound of our and er)

Leonine rhyme – a kind of internal rhyme in which the last word before the caesura (the pause) rhymes with the last word in the line example: The sky. A plane in the sky.

Seven firmaments of heaven to hell, 8 Million Stories to tell

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Facing It

By Yusef Komunyakaa

My black face fades,   

hiding inside the black granite.   

I said I wouldn't  

dammit: No tears.   

I'm stone. I'm flesh.   

My clouded reflection eyes me   

like a bird of prey, the profile of night  

slanted against morning. I turn   

this way—the stone lets me go.  

I turn that way—I'm inside   

the Vietnam Veterans Memorial again, depending on the light   

to make a difference.   

I go down the 58,022 names,   

half-expecting to find   

my own in letters like smoke.  

I touch the name Andrew Johnson;   

I see the booby trap's white flash.   

Names shimmer on a woman's blouse   

but when she walks away   

the names stay on the wall.   

Brushstrokes flash, a red bird's   

wings cutting across my stare.   

The sky. A plane in the sky. 

A white vet's image floats   

closer to me, then his pale eyes   

look through mine. I'm a window.   

He's lost his right arm   

inside the stone. In the black mirror   

a woman’s trying to erase names:   

No, she's brushing a boy's hair.