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Explain the disagreement in "Introduction to Poetry"
The speaker and his students disagree on how to read poems.
What is the theme or message in "The Road Not Taken"?
When making a choice, there is worry about making the wrong choice and anxiety never truly knowing what the other path in life would have been like.
Describe the structure of a haiku
A haiku is typically unrhymed.
It is three lines.
Each line has a certain number of syllables: 5-7-5.
In the following line from Edna St. Vincent Millay's sonnet, identify the poetic device.
"I was not one for keeping/Rubbed in a cage a wing that would be free" (7-9).
metaphor
Describe the form of the poem "Let my spirit fly in time"
The poem's lines erratically flow all over the page and there is not predictable structure. This is meant to mirror the structure of jazz music.
What does the repetition of the word "I" reveal in "Introduction to Poetry"?
The speaker is personally invested in how his students read and interact with poetry.
What do we learn about fame in "Ex-Basketball Player"?
It is short-lived.
Discuss the structure of the lines in "Three Haiku"; why are the lines spaced irregularly?
To mirror the distance the speaker feels from the seasons as they are always changing.
What is the mood of the final couplet in "Well, I Have Lost You, and Lost you Fairly"?
hopeful
Besides jazz, what else does Esteves compare poetry to in "Let my spirit fly in time"?
space
rivers
flowers
a journey towards the sun
life roots
jewels
lightening clouds
Why does Zephaniah use informal diction in "Dis Poetry"?
To show how personal his relationship to poetry is
Discuss the device in the quote below from "Ex-Basketball Player":
"The ball loved Flick" (Updike 17)
Personification helps the reader to see how significant basketball is.
What device is demonstrated in the quote below?
"It would melt/in my hand" (Basho 1-2)
Imagery
Explain how the form of the sonnet aids Millay in sharing her message in "Well I have lost you, and lost you fairly"
First part of a sonnet explains the problem (the breakup), and the second part explains the solution (coming to terms with the break-up and looking towards a day when she can not be sad and speak positively about her ex).
The mention of Coltrane in "Let my spirit fly in time" is an example of what device?
Allusion
In "Dis Poetry", what is poetry ultimately about to the speaker
love or "LUV"
Identify the device from "Ex-Basketball Player" and discuss the signficance.
"His hands were like wild birds" (Updike 19).
This is a simile meant to show how talented a player Flick was.
"Spring!" (Basho 7)
Discuss the tone in this line.
How is the idea of the passage of time shown through imagery in William Shakespeare's "Sonnet 65"?
Shakespeare discusses many earth/powerful images like brass, stone, earth, boundless sea, and steel that are all destroyed eventually by time.
What does the quote below from Atwood's poem reveal?
"there is no city/this is the center of a forest" (Atwood 29-30).
The conflict of nature vs humanity
In "Introduction to Poetry" analyze the metaphors used to explain either how the teacher wants the students to interact with poetry or the metaphors used to explain how the students interact with poetry.
teacher: interacting with poetry is active and pleasurable
students: interacting with poetry is violent and torturous
Discuss the repetition in the quote below from "The Road Not Taken".
"and I,/I took the one less traveled by" (Frost 18-19)
Comparing spring to "a nameless hill/in the haze" (Basho 8-9) is an example of what device?
metaphor
What is significant about the "black ink" in "Sonnet 65"
Writing is the solution to fighting the decay that comes with time; through writing, the speaker is able to share his love for eternity
Analyze the following example of imagery from "A Bus Along St. Clair: December":
"Though they buried me in monuments/of concrete slabs" (Atwood 6-7).
The imagery is negative, the connotation of the word "buried is negative", the use of the word "they" is accusatory. All are meant to show how man's creation destroy nature and is oppressive.