Home › Glossary › Letter C

Chromatic rhyme

Rhyme
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

Want to hear it? Click the Listen button to hear the browser speak the word using text-to-speech!

The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

Rhymes organized according to color associations or wavelength metaphors

Detailed Definition
Chromatic rhyme links words that share vowel or consonant coloration without exact sonic match—such as slant rhyme, assonance, or consonance—creating a spectrum of near-resonances; this technique expands rhyme’s expressive range beyond perfect correspondence to include tonal and textural harmony.
Example
Example in poetry:
Chromatic rhyme: Rhyme based on vowel color or timbre rather than exact sound—e.g., “stone” and “moon” share a resonant ‘o’ quality, creating a chromatic (tonal) rhyme in modernist verse.
Additional Notes
Chromatic rhyme uses near-rhymes based on vowel color or timbre rather than exact sound (e.g., “stone”/“storm”); expands sonic palette in modern verse.
Also Known As
Color rhyme hue correspondence chromatic sound colorful echo Kaleidoscopic rhyme prismatic end-sound prismatic rhyme
Skip to main content