Verse (L. vertere, “to turn”) is literature written in lines. The term is agricultural: a farmer plows a line (a versus) in a field until he turns to the next line, just as a poet writes one line (a verse) until he turns to his next.

There are three kinds of literature: verse, drama, and prose. Insofar as form conditions and comments upon content, each kind of literature makes an argument by the writer’s choice to write in that kind. The argument of verse is that the specialized, technical, idiosyncratic way in which a poet writes his words demands a close, deliberate, informed way of reading those words.

There are some basic features of literary analysis that you have probably encountered before – grammar, syntax, rhythm, meter, rhyme – and you might even be able to diagram a sentence or scan a line of verse or chart a rhyme scheme. You might be able to do so when you’re asked, but it’s very possible that you have no idea why these things matter. In all likelihood, no one’s ever told you why they matter, and you’ve had to accept on faith the claim that technical analysis of language is important. Literary studies helps you see what a poet is trying to say when he or she puts the subject at the end of a sentence, or makes you say a three-syllable word in two, or ends a poem with a word that doesn’t really rhyme.

A line of verse is usually divided into feet, or units, which consist of a number of syllables (Gk. σύν, syn, “together” + λαμβάνειν, “to take”), which are letters taken together to produce a single sound. The syllables in feet are either stressed or unstressed. There are different terms for stressed (long/ictus/arsis) and unstressed (short/breve/thesis) syllables, but they all do the same work for scansion.

Scansion (L. scandere, “to climb, scan”) is the art of dividing verse into feet and then syllables that are either stressed or unstressed when spoken naturally.

Rhythm (Gk. ῥυθμός, rhythmos, “measured motion, time, proportion, etc.”) is the pattern of stressed and unstressed syllables measured in a foot or a line of verse.

Meter (Gk. μέτρον metron, “measure, rule, length, size”) is an abstract pattern of verse rhythm.

A caesura (L. caedre, “to cut”) is the rhythmic pause in a line. In Greek and Latin prosody it is the division of a metrical foot between two words, especially in certain recognized places near the middle of the line. In English prosody it is pause or breathing-place about the middle of a metrical line, generally indicated by a pause in the sense.

Rhyme (Gk. ἀριθμός arithmos, “measured motion, time, proportion, etc.”) is agreement in the terminal sounds of two or more words or metrical lines, such that (in English prosody) the last stressed vowel and any sounds following it are the same, while the sound or sounds preceding are different. Examples: which, rich; grew, too; peace, increase; leather, together; descended, extended.

Grammar (Gk. γράϕειν, graphein, “to write”) is skill of writing correctly by using proper word forms to indicate relations between words.

Syntax (Gk. συν syn, “together,” and τάσσις táxis, “arrangement”) is the arrangement of words in a certain order. In verse, it is always important when a sentence is grammatically correct but syntactically unusual.

Verse can be narrative or lyric. Verse is narrative (L. narrare, “to recount”) when it recounts the actions that comprise an event or several events. Verse is Lyric (Gk. lyrikos, “singing to the lyre”) when it is meant to be musical more than expository.

The first and most popular kind of narrative verse is epic (Gk. epos, “word, narrative”), which is a long poem that often recounts the origin of the author’s nation or culture. The narrative structure of an epic can be either unified or episodic (or both).

If the epic is unified (L. uni “one” + facere “to make”), the action is singular – it can be plotted on a single line – collectively related to one distinct event with a beginning, a middle, and an end. If the epic is episodic (Gk. εις, eis, “into” + ὁδός, odos, “way”), the action is plural – and as the action is extraneous, so the plot is digressive, circular – variously related to multiple events that are loosely intertwined, so that an end is always a new beginning.

Sometimes poems tell stories that aren’t about the founding of an empire, which is to say that not all narrative verse is epic. Shorter narrative verse is sometimes called epyllion (Gk. epos, “word, narrative” + diminutive ion). There are also sonnet sequences (L. sonus, “sound,” + sequi, “to follow”); closet dramas (L. claudere, “to shut,” + Gk. dran, “to do”); and dramatic monologues (Gk. dran, “to do,” + monos, “single,” + logos, “speech”).

Lyric poetry can be divided into songs and sonnets. Songs (OE singan, “to chant”) are short verse poems that can take any number of forms, while sonnets (L. sonus, “sound”) follow one of a very few similar lyric forms.