Your desk has become a jungle
A metaphor describes one thing through another to suggest a likeness. Say “My desk is a jungle” when papers and cables have taken over. You are borrowing the jungle’s tangled, crowded image. Nobody needs to water the stapler.
Merriam-Webster explains this transfer of meaning. The words invite you to notice a shared quality, rather than take the description literally.
Three examples, three different links
“My desk is a jungle.” The connection is the tangle: finding one receipt feels like picking a route through thick growth.
“Her question was a key.” Imagine one question suddenly helping a group understand a problem. The question has not grown metal teeth; it opens a way into the idea.
“The inbox was a snowdrift.” In this invented scene, messages have piled up until the important ones seem buried. The link is the accumulating heap, not the temperature of your email.
What changes when you add “like”?
Compare “My desk is a jungle” with “My desk is like a jungle.” The second makes the comparison explicit. That is a simile, a comparison often introduced by like or as.
Merriam-Webster distinguishes the two devices. Both versions point towards the same crowded desk; they phrase the connection differently.
Look for the shared quality
A sentence with is is not automatically a metaphor. “My desk is wooden” can simply describe its material. Ask what image is being borrowed and which quality it brings.
Words have other ways to surprise you too. An idiom such as “a piece of cake” has an established phrase-level meaning, while an oxymoron brings apparently clashing ideas together. The useful clue is what the words are doing in that sentence.