Sometimes when you start to speak idiomatically,
You’ll start to be poetic automatically.
This is because idioms are mostly metaphorical,
And contain, to your surprise, some elements rhetorical.
For example, when you say, “A stitch in time saves nine”,
“bright-eyed, bushy tailed”, “let your little light shine”,
And many more like these, you use, though you don’t know it,
Literary devices, like metaphor, that make you a poet.

When you use sound devices like alliteration,
Or occasionally rhyme, you create a sensation,
And people will never forget what you say,
Because you say it in a creative and colourful way.

I recommend that you use these poetic devices
To add to your speech some tasty new spices.

– Emile Joseph

The author teaches the English language to adult migrants and is passionate about all things linguistic. He is also a serious conservative at heart, who treasures the beauty, the poetry and the gallantry of yesteryear. He is happily married with two young children in Sydney.

SydneyTrads is the web page of the Sydney Traditionalist Forum: an association of young professionals who form part of the Australian independent right (also known as “non-aligned right”).