Why are the Illiad, Odyssey, and other epic poems considered poems?
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Poems don’t have to rhyme, but they follow some other type of strict structure that makes them words sound more in synch, almost like you can sing them.
I’m am not very familiar with the exact composition of ancient poetry, but they followed things called metres and feet. In short, words had to have certain amounts of consonants and different emphasis. For example:
>TA-ta, Tu-TU-tu, te-te-TE-te.
These are words have different poetic values, but don’t rhyme. Greek and Roman poems required certain words of different consonants and emphasis in different places. When you would read these poems aloud—which was the main way of transmission—it would sound like it flowed better; it was pleasing to the ear.
The opposite of poetry is prose, where you don’t really follow any rules and just write as you please.
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