Poetry is a way of expressing different experiences, thoughts, and emotions. Unlike other forms of writing, poems are compressed into fewer words and are arranged in lines and stanzas, instead of sentences and paragraphs. Most poems usually use meter and rhymes. "Poetry" by Marianne Moore and "Ars Poetica" by Archibald MacLeish are both examples of poetry. Although the both of them are types of poetry and have similarities, they are also different from each other in many ways. They compare and contrast with each other in the types of poems, the figures of speech, and in theme.
             "Poetry" and "Ars Poetica" are different types of poems. Poetry is a free verse. It avoids the use of regular rhyme, rhythm, and meter. An example of this is, " To discriminate against 'business documents and school-books'; all these phenomena are important..."(103). As shown in the example, there are no rhyme schemes, there are no meters, and no real rhythm. "Ars Poetica", on the other hand, is a lyric poem that has end rhymes and is a couplet. It has highly musical verses that express what the poet feels about poems. An example is the stanza that says, " A poem should be palpable and mute... As a globed fruit"(97). The example shows that it is musical. It flows nicely with two lines in a stanza and rhymes in the end. Another way the poetry is different is the figures of speech used.
             In both poems, figures of speech are used. In "Poetry", simile is used. It compares by using the words "like" or "as". An example of this is displayed when it states, " The moveable critic twitching his skin like a horse ball fan, the statistician..."(103). This compares a horse twitching to a poem someone cannot understand. Simile is also displayed in "Ars Poetica" when it says, "Dumb... As old medallions to the thumb.&...