Literature Glossary
Don’t be an oxymoron. Know your literary terms.
Over 200 literary terms, Shmooped to perfection.
Concrete Poetry
Definition:
Concrete poetry is totally wrapped up in its looks.
We don't mean it's vain, or that it can't pass a reflective surface (mirrors, windows, larger-than-average toasters) without checkin' its pretty self out. Rather, we mean that concrete poetry is poetry where the way the poem appears on the page is given as much, if not more, emphasis than the actual words.
Concrete poems blur the line between poetry and visual art. The most common form of concrete poetry is one where the shape of the poem itself is tangled up in the meaning of the words on the page. The words in Lewis Carroll's "The Mouse's Tale," for example, wind across the page like a tapered, well, mouse-tail. "The Altar" by George Herbert is in the shape of an altar. Guess what shape George Starbuck's "Sonnet in the Shape of a Potted Christmas Tree" is?
Yup.