POETIC SYMBOLS IN IGBO POEMS

Abstract

Poetry is the set of writing stories, experiences, thought into verse. It is one of the three literary genres. A symbol is something that represents something else. An object, person, place, event or actors that suggests more than its literary meaning. Although symbols are indirect, they are designed to clarify one’s understanding of what they describe. Poet frequently uses symbols to capture readers’ interest and imagination. Symbols include traditional symbols or conventional symbols and private symbols etc. Traditional or conventional symbols are symbols that hold roughly the same meaning for members of a given society. While the private symbols are the one that has acquired certain meaning from a single poet’s repeated use of it. Since writers’ tool is word made possible by the language use, symbols have become an effective tools and technique with which lgbo poets unfold societal and moral ills in the society. Through a conscious, art and artistic, rendition of symbols in poetry, realities of human lives disguised under the umbrella of poetry are portrayed