<![CDATA[Figurative language is often taught as a set of rhetorical categories, although understanding poetry requires learners to move beyond identifying figures of speech toward explaining how linguistic choices construct meanings, emotions, and values. This study examines the forms, meanings, and stylistic functions of figurative language in Helvy Tiana Rosa’s poetry collection Jantung yang Berdetak dalam Batu and explores its pedagogical affordances for poetry learning at the junior secondary level. The study employed a qualitative textual design informed by stylistics and pedagogical stylistics. Ten poems were purposively selected from the collection based on the diversity of their figurative expressions and themes. The textual analysis was complemented by curriculum documents, Grade VIII learning materials, and an interview with an Indonesian language teacher at SMP Muhammadiyah 3 Sirampog. The analysis identified 60 instances of figurative language: 19 similes (31.67%), 16 metaphors (26.67%), 14 personifications (23.33%), four repetitions (6.67%), four hyperboles (6.67%), two ironies (3.33%), and one paradox (1.67%). More importantly, these devices function not merely as aesthetic ornaments but as meaning-making resources that concretize abstract experience, construct imagery and emotional atmosphere, intensify messages, and articulate ethical and sociocultural concerns. Pedagogically, the findings suggest that the poems can support an evidence-based sequence of identifying linguistic forms, locating textual evidence, interpreting contextual meanings, and transforming interpretation into discussion and creative writing. The study therefore extends figurative-language analysis from taxonomic identification toward pedagogical stylistics that connects linguistic evidence, literary interpretation, and productive engagement with poetry.]]>
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