The Bedford Glossary of Critical and Literary Terms - Ross Murfin 2018

Poetic license

Poetic license: Narrowly defined, the linguistic liberty taken by poets in composing verse. This liberty typically involves deviations from normal patterns of speech and prose for poetic effect or to meet the demands of versification. Poets may use unusual syntax, archaisms or neologisms, wrenched accent, eye rhymes or half rhymes rather than perfect rhymes, and so forth. Defined more broadly, poetic license also encompasses nonlinguistic liberties, such as anachronism or extreme coincidence, and applies to any literary form, not just poetry. Writers may thus deviate not only from virtually any rule, convention, or standard of discourse but even from logical dictates or accepted views of reality for the sake of artistic effect. When misused, poetic license is the mark of a poetaster or other incompetent writer.