Metaphor
A metaphor names one thing as another to create a direct comparison without using like or as. Poets use metaphors to make an idea feel more immediate, concrete, or revealing by linking it to something readers can picture or feel.
Metaphors can appear in a single line or stretch through an entire poem as an extended comparison.
Example
The city was a furnace at dusk,
its windows flickering like coals;
my tired heart was a paper boat
floating through that river of heat.
Here are a couple of well-known metaphor examples from famous poems, each illustrating how poets use comparison to deepen meaning:
- “Hope is the thing with feathers” — Emily Dickinson
In this extended metaphor, hope is compared to a bird that perches in the soul and sings endlessly. The image suggests resilience, lightness, and endurance even during hardship.
- “All the world’s a stage” — William Shakespeare (As You Like It)
This famous metaphor compares life to a theatrical performance, with people as actors playing assigned roles. It emphasizes the transient, performative, and cyclical nature of human existence.
Related Definitions
[n] a figure of speech in which an expression is used to refer to something that it does not literally denote in order to suggest a similarity
Related Terms
accordance, agent, agreement, alikeness, allegory, alliance, alliteration, allusion, alternate, alternative, anacoluthon, anadiplosis, analogue, analogy, anaphora, anastrophe, antiphrasis, antithesis, antonomasia, aping, apophasis, aporia, aposiopesis, ap