An oxymoron (usual plural oxymorons, less commonly the Latin-style oxymora) is a figure of speech that juxtaposes elements that appear to be contradictory.Oxymorons appear in a variety of contexts, including inadvertent errors (such as ground pilot) and literary oxymorons crafted to reveal a paradox.he most common form of oxymoron involves an adjective – noun combination of two words. For example, the following line from Tennyson 's Idylls of the King contains two oxymorons: