Aristotle's (384–322 BCE) observation 2,500 years ago in Rhetoric: ‘Those words are most pleasant which give us new knowledge. Strange words have no meaning for us; common terms we know already. It is metaphor which gives us most of this pleasure.’ He also stated: ‘To be a master of metaphor is a sign of genius.’
Literature is littered with examples where authors use metaphor, sometimes in ingenious ways. The American poet, Emily Dickinson (1830–1886), comes to mind. Her original manuscripts often showcase her idiosyncratic grammar, punctuation, and metaphorical daring, which were later ‘corrected’ by editors. An example of this (the opening line is also the title of her poem):
I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading - treading - till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through -
The ‘Funeral in my Brain’ is a startling metaphor for mental collapse or existential crisis. It internalises a public ritual into private torment.
A visual metaphor: The time for change is running out. – Image generated 30/7/2023
The use of metaphor in poetry is one of the most important aspects in a poetic style that should be mastered. Metaphors that are sustained throughout also provide depth and inner complexity to the poem. It works on many levels in poetry by referring to something in a brief but effective way.
There are two parts to a metaphor: The tenor and the vehicle. The tenor is the thing being compared, and the vehicle what you are comparing it to. Like all comparisons, metaphors must contain elements that can be compared logically, even if not explicitly.
A Quick Guide to Spotting Metaphor
Metaphor is the art of saying one thing as another—without using ‘like’ or ‘as’. It’s a way of transferring meaning, emotion, or imagery from one domain to another. Metaphors can be subtle or bold, literal or surreal, but they always ask the reader to see differently.
What to Look For
- Transfer of meaning: One thing is described as another, not just compared.
- No ‘like’ or ‘as’: That’s simile. Metaphor skips the comparison and goes straight to transformation.
- Personification: A subtype of metaphor where non-human things are given human traits.
Example 1: Personification
our love lies buried in someone else’s arms
Here, love is treated as a body—capable of lying down, being buried, and belonging elsewhere. This is personification: love is not literally a person, but the metaphor gives it human agency and emotional weight.
Example 2: Extended Personification
Dusk smiles, as Sun lost its taste for colour.
Both Dusk and Sun are personified. Dusk smiles—a human gesture. Sun loses its taste—a metaphor for fading light, rendered through sensory language. This line layers metaphor with emotional nuance.
Example 3: Abstract Metaphor
Grief is a locked room with no windows.
Grief becomes a physical space—claustrophobic, inescapable. The metaphor helps us feel the emotion through spatial imagery.
Example 4: Implied Metaphor
She barked orders until silence obeyed.
No direct comparison is made, but ‘barked’ implies she is like a dog. ‘Silence obeyed’ personifies silence, suggesting it has ears and will.
Example 5: Conceptual Metaphor
Time is a thief.
This classic metaphor assigns criminal intent to time, suggesting it steals moments, youth, or joy. It’s conceptual—time isn’t literally a thief, but the metaphor reshapes how we think about it.
Example 6: Implied Metaphor
golden baked skin
This phrase evokes sunbathing and warmth without directly naming the sun or the act. The metaphor is implied through sensory language and cultural association. From my prose poetry collection:
Aurum is the essence of my soul that is distilled from the crucible of the African sun on my golden baked skin under which I apricate without fear of gilding the lily.
Here, metaphor is layered: Aurum (Latin for gold) becomes soul, the sun becomes a crucible, and skin becomes both canvas and alchemical site.
Example 7: Mixed Metaphor
We’ll burn that bridge when we come to it.
This line fuses two idioms—‘burning bridges’ and ‘crossing that bridge when we come to it’—into a mixed metaphor. The result is humorous or jarring, often used intentionally in satire or to signal confusion.
Example 8: Dead Metaphor
nip in the bud, green with envy, someone ploughs their own furrow …
These are examples of dead metaphors—so familiar that their original imagery fades from view. Also called frozen or historical metaphors, they often survive as idioms. While they no longer evoke vivid pictures, they still carry metaphorical meaning.
Versus Clichés: These are overused expressions that have lost their freshness or emotional impact. Phrases like ‘at the end of the day’ or ‘think outside the box’ that were never metaphorical to begin with.
The Difference in Function
- Dead metaphors are about faded imagery.
- Clichés are about tired usage.
The Rose of Jericho is a potent metaphor for resurrection, renewal, and resilience.
In Practice
An intriguing technique in poetic metaphor is the oscillation between literal and figurative statements across the arc of a poem. Rather than placing metaphor in stark juxtaposition with the literal—as is common in contrast-driven verse—this method allows metaphor to emerge gradually, echoing or reframing earlier lines. The result is a soft dissolution of boundaries: metaphor becomes less a decorative flourish and more a tonal undercurrent, subtly altering the reader’s perception without abrupt shifts. In this way, metaphor loses its role as foil and instead becomes a resonance—an afterimage that deepens the literal through delayed metaphorical bloom.
https://www.poetrysoup.com/poem/rose_of_jericho_1769586
In my poem, Rose of Jericho, I’ve crafted a delayed oscillation that doesn’t just toggle between metaphor and literal, but allows one to echo and refract the other across the poem’s arc:
From the 1st stanza: the bleached bones of tradition
&
From the final stanza: collected like a rag-and-bone man of old
Unlike metaphor (the 1st line), which fuses or substitutes one idea for another, simile (the 2nd line) preserves the separation between the two elements, allowing the comparison to remain more literal and transparent.
The Salient Differences
All tropes are instruments of evocation—designed to stir mood, awaken emotion, or conjure physical sensation. Among them, metaphor stands as the most vital spoor: a trace of meaning that leads us beyond the literal into the felt. A well-crafted trope doesn’t merely decorate language; it animates it, making a piece of writing memorable and immersive by transfiguring detail into experience. In essence, a literary trope is the strategic use of figurative language—whether word, phrase, or image—to achieve artistic resonance. Metaphor, as trope’s most agile emissary, collapses distance between the known and the ineffable, allowing us to feel thought and think feeling.
Some Common Tropes
- Metaphor: A poetic assertion that one thing is another, blending identities.
Her smile was sunshine.
- Analogy: A broader comparison that may use simile or metaphor to explain or clarify.
The Ground is thirsty.
Readers immediately reject a literal interpretation and confidently interpret the words to mean ‘The ground is dry’, an analogy to the condition that would trigger thirst in an animal.
- Simile: A direct comparison using ‘like’ or ‘as’, keeping the two ideas distinct.
Her smile was like sunshine.
Or a comparison without ‘like’ or ‘as’:
Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day? / Thou art more lovely and more temperate … ~William Shakespeare, Sonnet 18
But than introduces comparative simile, a hybrid that blends simile with comparative syntax:
More tired than a teen that has to clean his room.
- Synecdoche: A figure of speech where a part represents the whole or vice versa.
I have many mouths to feed on my meagre salary.
‘Mouths to feed’ evokes children through a single, stress-laden detail—part metaphor, part synecdoche.
Metaphorical Overreach
No literary discussion nowadays seems to be complete without dragging Artificial Intelligence into it. The following is a classic case of metaphorical overreach—where poetic ambition outruns spatial logic.
She was a lighthouse in the desert, guiding his heart through the fog of uncertainty.
Let’s unpack the wreckage:
- Lighthouses don’t belong in deserts.
- Fog rarely rolls through arid landscapes.
- Hearts don’t navigate terrain like ships.
- And yet, the metaphor tries to stitch emotional clarity onto a topographical absurdity.
A woman in Tbilisi, Georgia, calmly applying lip gloss using the reflective surface of a riot police shield during a protest. The photo, shared widely on Reddit, has sparked global conversation for its striking juxtaposition. It is both metaphor & symbol.
The Fine Line between Metaphor and Symbolism
Symbolism is not to be confused with metaphor. It’s the use of specific objects or images to represent abstract ideas. A symbol must be something tangible or visible, while the idea it symbolises must be something abstract or universal. In many instances, symbolism has its roots in mythology, eg in my haiku:
raven-smudged sky
a lone cricket chirp in
overgrown garden
- Although the raven is often associated with loss and ill omen, its symbolism is complex; it also represents prophecy and insight. In my poem, it evokes mythic resonance without asserting a literal or metaphorical equivalence.
- The garden isn’t a memory or a grave—it’s a setting rich with symbolic cues: decay, solitude, nature reclaiming space.
However, when something is symptomatic, eg of decay, it’s often symbolic, especially in poetry—because it gestures toward the idea of decay, not just its physical evidence. But it’s not a metaphor unless you’re asserting a direct comparison. For example:
rust blooms across the gate
- Symptomatic: The rust is a sign of decay—literal corrosion.
- Symbolic: The rust might evoke neglect, abandonment, or time’s passage.
- Metaphoric: If you say ‘rust is memory’s tattoo’, you’re making a metaphor—a poetic equivalence.
EXAMPLE: The Future of Poetry | Poem (poetrysoup.com)
ideas drip
with nostalgia …
pungent like rust
- Symptomatic: Rust’s acrid tang becomes a symptom of decay, not just physical but emotional.
- Symbolic: Rust here becomes a symbol of memory’s corrosion.
- Metaphoric (by implication): So while it doesn’t say ‘nostalgia is rust’, the poem gestures toward equivalence—a metaphoric undercurrent that simile alone doesn’t fully contain.
Conclusion
Metaphor has many guises, but the savvy poet uses it with flair and can spot a fake or forced metaphor a mile off.
When reading a poem, ask:
- Is something being described as something else?
- Is a non-human thing acting like a person?
- Is the image literal—or is it asking me to imagine?
If yes, you’ve likely found a metaphor.
The title of this article, ‘On the Spoor of Metaphor’, evokes the image of a tracker following faint traces through terrain, searching for something elusive yet deeply present. ‘Spoor’ refers to the trail or scent left by an animal, often used in the context of hunting or tracking in the wild. By pairing it with ‘metaphor’, I’m suggesting that metaphor itself is a creature to be pursued, studied; perhaps even communed with.
Source: The Poems of Emily Dickinson: Variorum Edition (Harvard University Press, 1983)