As poets, we are especially aware of the senses and how they can make writing vivid. The senses should work to transport our readers into our world and bring the poem to life.

Reading general descriptions takes the information you read, via the normal reading mechanism, the visual cortex that helps us perceive letters and words.

The phonological cortex that maps the sounds to letters.

The semantic cortex that stores word meanings, and the syntactic cortex, that helps us understand the rules and structure of lines or sentences. Each part of the brain works in concert by forming efficient and fast pathways as we read.

Information from the senses passes through the sensory register to immediate memory and then on to working memory for conscious processing. If you attach sense and meaning to the reading, it is likely to be stored and processed more meaningfully. The self-concept often determines how much attention the reader will give to new information.Therefore its better not to simply tell your reader how you feel what you see hear or what is going on but show them by vivid description and imagery incorporating some sense bound imagery.

Do not tell readers that “ grass is green” or “ the sky is blue” unless that adds something to the meaning or emotion of the piece. On the whole the reader already knows that and you are wasting precious words. Don’t state the obvious. Ask yourself, What is the narrator seeing? and follow with, does it matter here? Is this useful for the reader to know? Incorporate specific sense bound information that will assist the reader to dive into meaning. Authors use imagery to create rich, livable experiences using the senses.

Think of imagery as a doorway into the world of the text. It allows the reader to see, smell, hear, taste, and feel everything that happens in a poem or a story. You will highlight the most important sensory information in your imagery, you are the filter for the reader. If you consider where you are right now, as you’re reading this. There are many different sensory experiences vying for your attention, but your brain filters those senses out because they’re not important. You might be ignoring the sounds of your neighbors and passing traffic, or the context of music in the room, or the feeling of your chair pressing into your body. Imagery in literature performs the same function: it highlights the most important sensory information that the reader needs to want to engage with your writing. Great imagery examples set the stage for great storytelling, goading the reader into the world of the work.There are seven distinct types of imagery:

• Visual

• Auditory.

• Olfactory

• Gustatory.

• Tactile.

• Kinesthetic.

Organic .

Sensory images trigger an emotional reaction in the reader. They also suggest and create the context for understanding the rest of the poem. For example, a dark and stormy afternoon could set the backdrop of conflict. A conversation between two friends on a dark windswept shore may foreshadow trouble or treachery. If the same conversation took place on a sunny day during a walk in a park, the reader comes away with a totally different understanding.

Our most prolific sense is usually our vision and we use it in description all the time but it’s good to use at least one other sense in a short poem. Choose the best for context, it is unrealistic in short poems to incorporate all the senses without overwhelming the reader.

Visual imagery

Visual imagery appeals to the sense of sight and plays the largest role in imagery in literature. It describes what a scene or character looks like.

For instance:

“The dark blue and purple hues of twilight were reflected in the still water;the slight glint of disappearing sun an arc of golden blue highlighting the silhouette of a passing ship.”

The reader can imagine a still ocean scene at twilight as if they were standing on the edge of the water themselves.

Take the following excerpt from Louise Glück’s poem October:

“Daybreak. The low hills shine ochre

and fire, even the fields shine.

I know what I see; sun that could be

the August sun, returning

everything that was taken away —

The images in this excerpt are stunning, particularly “the low hills shine ochre and fire.” The reader can imagine a roiling green landscape tinged like a flame in the early sunrise, contributing to the speaker’s sense of hope that one often feels at the start of a new day. In poetry, as in prose, images are often juxtaposed next to feelings, creating a sensory and emotive experience. The language that each form uses to create those experiences is similar, but the poetic form encourages an economy of language, making imagery in poetry more concise.

Further examples of visual imagery in poetry.

“A field of cotton—as if the moon had flowered.”

Matsuo Bashō, from Basho: The Complete Haiku, translated by Jane Reichhold

Alfred Tennyson – Summer Night
Alfred Tennyson was another poet who made great use of visual imagery. See if you can get a clear picture of the summer night he describes in this poem

Now sleeps the crimson petal, now the white;

Nor waves the cypress in the palace walk;

Nor winks the gold fin in the porphyry font:

The firefly wakens: waken thou with me.

Now droops the milk-white peacock like a ghost,

And like a ghost she glimmers on to me.

Now lies the Earth all Danaë to the stars,

And all thy heart lies open unto me.

Now slides the silent meteor on, and leaves

A shining furrow, as thy thoughts in me.

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William Wordsworth – I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud
Next is an excerpt from “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” by William Wordsworth. The first and last stanzas show a progression of the poet’s emotions using visual imagery.

I wandered lonely as a cloud

That floats on high o’er vales and hills,

When all at once I saw a crowd,

A host, of golden daffodils;

Beside the lake, beneath the trees,

Fluttering and dancing in the breeze.