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A metaphor is an implied comparison of things basically unlike one another. When Paul Simon writes, "I am a rock. I am an island," we know that he is not penning a literal truth. Rocks and islands don't write or sing songs; however, the objects selected convey meaning that has more emotional appeal than any literary self-description. Compare, for instance, "I am a male of species Homo sapiens. I am tough, enduring and without sentiment or sensation. I am cut off from others like myself and have no need for or knowledge of abstractions such as love, fellowship, pain or pleasure."

Simon's metaphors pack more punch because of their brevity and the requirement of imaginative participation by the reader or listener. Similes, which use the words like, as, or than, do not have the same impact. Compare "I am like a rock and in a larger sense like an island."

Metaphors can also be implied rather than boldly stated. When the poet e e cummings writes of "The Cambridge ladies who live in furnished souls," the reader understands how these very proper women have souls and minds that are comparable to apartments that someone else has outfitted with the appropriate furniture. In other words, they unquestionably accept and espouse feelings and attitudes not generated by themselves but bottled or tinned and supplied by society.

Often a metaphor can extend through several sentences or even paragraphs of prose or the entirety of a poem. In her poem about the joys of reading and literature, Emily Dickinson creates an extended metaphor comparing books to modes of transportation.

There is no frigate like a book
To take us lands away,
Nor any coursers like a page
Of prancing poetry.
This traverse may the poorest take
Without oppress of toll;
How frugal is the chariot
That bears a human soul!

The artistry lies in the connotative evocations of her word choices. "Frigate" is more effective than, say, "tugboat," a two-syllable word that denotes a type of watercraft, because the former imports warlike adventure and speed not associated with the latter.

In the same way "coursers" is more effective than "horses"; "prancing" works better than "romping" or "bouncing," "chariot" better than "moving van," "bears" better than "lugs."

A caution when employing metaphors is not to mix them unless you are aiming at a comic effect. Recently a major political figure said that a "smoking gun" was a "mushroom cloud." His serious intended meaning was rendered laughable by the unintended incongruity of the images.

Also, certain metaphors have become cliches because of overuse. Suppose a character in a book or play were to deliver the line "You're skating on thin ice and are liable to end up in the soup," what impression would you derive of the person's intelligence?

Metaphor is one type of figurative language. Also available along with simile are allegory, overstatement (hyperbole), understatement (litotes), irony, personification, metonymy and synecdoche.

Metaphor and its weaker sister simile are probably the most common figures of speech and the most versatile tools in the crafting of effective and affective prose and poetry.

Learn more about this author, Kerry Michael Wood.
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