Caesura
Etymology
From Latin "caesura" (a cutting), from "caedere" (to cut), the same root behind "incision" and "scissors." The caesura is literally a cut made in the line, a place where the metrical flow is severed to let the voice rest.
noun · /sih-ZHOOR-uh/
A deliberate pause or break within a line of verse.
What it names
The breath inside a line — the internal silence that shapes a poem’s rhythm as much as its words do.
Example
The famous line splits at its caesura — "To be, or not to be" — and the pause carries the whole hesitation.
Related idea
A caesura is a pause within a line; enjambment is the opposite move — running a sentence past the line’s end without pause, so the two together control where a poem breathes and where it rushes.