Figurative Language

1
Figurative Language

• Also known as Figures of Speech

2
Types of Figurative Language

• Simile comparison between two unlike things,
  using like, as, resembles or than
• Metaphor refers to one thing as if it were
  another unlike thing without the use of like, as,
  resembles or than
• Personification a type of metaphor in which
  nonhuman things or qualities are referred to as
  if it were human
• Symbol a person, place or thing that has
  meaning on its own, as well as standing for
  something else
• Hyperbole extreme exaggeration used for
  emphasis.

3
The Toaster

• A silver-scaled Dragon with jaws flaming red
• Sits at my elbow and toasts my bread.
• I hand him fat slices, and then, one by one,
• He hands them back when he sees they are done.
• -- William Jay Smith

4
Apartment House

• A filing cabinet of human lives
• Where people swarm like bees in tunneled hives,
• Each to his own cell in the towered comb,
• Identical and crampedwe call it home.
• -- Gerald Raftery

5
The Base Stealer

• Poised between going on and back, pulled
• Both ways taut like a tightrope-walker,
• Fingertips pointing the opposites,
• Now bouncing tiptoe like a dropped ball
• Or a kid skipping rope, come on, come on,
• Running a scattering of steps sidewise,
• How he teeters, skitters, tingles, teases,
• Taunts them, hovers like an ecstatic bird,
• Hes only flirting, crowd him, crowd him,
• Delicate, delicate, delicate, delicate now!
• -- Robert Francis

6
Dreams

• Hold fast to dreams
• For if dreams die
• Life is a broken-winged bird
• That cannot fly.
• Hold fast to dreams
• For when dreams go
• Life is a barren field
• Frozen with snow.
• -- Langston Hughes

7
April

• Its lemonade, its lemonade, its daisy.
• Its a roller-skating, scissor-grinding day
• Its gingham-waisted, chocolate flavored, lazy,
• With the children flower-scattered at their play.
• Its the sun like watermelon,
• And the sidewalks overlaid
• With a glaze of yellow yellow
• Like a jar of marmalade.
• Continue

8
April continued

• Then the rich magenta evening
• Like a sauce upon the walk,
• And the porches softly swinging
• With a hammockful of talk.
• Its the hobo at the corner
• With his lilac-sniffing gait,
• And the shy departing thunder
• Of the fast departing skate.

9
April continued

• Its lemonade, its lemonade, its April!
• A water sprinkler, puddle winking time,
• When a boy who peddles slowly, with a smile
  remote and holy,
• Sells you April chocolate for a dime.
• -- Marcia Masters

10
Fireworks

• Not guns, not thunder, but a flutter of clouded
  drums
• That announce a fiesta abruptly, fiery needles
• Circumscribe on the night boundless
  chrysanthemums.
• Softly, they break apart, they flake away, where
• Darkness, on a svelte hiss, swallows them.
• Delicate brilliance a bellflower opens, fades,
• In a sprinkle of falling stars.
• Night absorbs them
• With the sponge of her silence.
• -- Babette Deutsch

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Examples of Simile

• Her lips were soft as rose petals.
• My love is like a can of tuna. ?
• The water sparkled like thousands of diamonds.
• The dog danced around like loose litter in the
  wind.

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Examples of Metaphor

• Her eyes were saucers.
• Harry, the brightly dressed peacock.
• The Olympic runner is the wind
• Mr. Smith is an encyclopedia of sports trivia.
• The cup of hot tea was the best medicine for my
  cold.

13
Examples of Personification

• The light danced on the surface of the water.
• I could hear the animals laughing as I traveled,
  lost, in circles, through the forest.
• The clouds cried

14
Examples of Symbolism

• Dove peace
• Chains imprisonment
• Cross Christianity
• Flag patriotism
• Red passion violence blood
• Spring new beginnings birth
• Lamb gentleness innocence

15
Examples of Hyperbole

• My shoes are killing me!
• Its raining cats and dogs!
• I died laughing.
• My moms going to explode when she gets my grades!