ABSTRACT
Repetition mesmerizes, the challenge to the poet is to use it so it engages rather than dulls, entices rather than restates the obvious. The refrain functions as a totality, a unit that is repeated over and over. Poems on the page use repetition in ways that are highly effective in their insistences but not so massive. Perhaps the besoknown form of poetic repetition is anaphora. Whitman as a poet of expansiveness, and given the look of his work long, accumulating lines and his feeling for the open road. Whitman's huge imagination spoke to democratic actuality and democratic spirituality. The chapter explains about contemporary African- American poet, Cornelius Eady who, has raised repetition to a vibrant and fine art. Nursery rhymes are fond of repetition, saying the same thing over and over for the joy of saying it. Shakespeare's songs play all manner of variations on repetition.
