Poetry Response 1-2
Complete 1 set of questions from Part 1 and 1 set of questions from Part 2.
Part 1:
The Eagle
Alfred, Lord Tennyson
He clasps the crag with crooked hands;
Close to the sun in lonely lands,
Ringed with the azure world, he stands.
The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls;
He watches from his mountain walls,
And like a thunderbolt he falls.
1. What is peculiarly effective about the
expressions “crooked hands,” “Close to the
sun,” “Ringed with the azure world,”
“wrinkled,” “crawls,” and “like a
thunderbolt”?
2. Notice the formal pattern of the poem,
particularly the contrast of “he stands” in the
first stanza and “he falls” in the second. Is
there any other contrast between the two
stanzas?
3. How do sound devices such as alliteration,
assonance and consonance function in the
poem?
Winter
William Shakespeare
When icicles hang by the wall,
And Dick the shepherd blows his nail,
And Tom bears logs into the hall,
And milk comes frozen home in pail,
When blood is nipped and ways be foul,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
“Tu-whit, to-who!”
A merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel1the pot.
When all aloud the wind doth blow,
And coughing drowns the parson’s saw,
And birds sit brooding in the snow,
And Marian’s nose looks red and raw,
When roasted crabs2 hiss in the bowl,
Then nightly sings the staring owl,
“Tu-white, tu-who!”
A merry note,
While greasy Joan doth keel the pot.
skim
1.
crab apples
2.
1. Is the owl’s cry really a “merry” note? How
are this adjective and the verb “sings”
employed?
2. In what ways does the owl’s cry contrast
with the other details of the poem?
3. Is there a “theme” to this poem? Do poems
have to have themes?
4. How does the poet use details to suggest
certain qualities about winter instead of
merely stating those qualities?
Dulce et Decorum Est
Wilfred Owen

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,

Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through
sludge,
Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs,
And towards our distant rest began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots,
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame, all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots
Of gas-shells dropping softly behind.
Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!—An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time,
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime.—
Dim through the misty panes and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.

In all my dreams before my helpless sight

He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.

If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace

Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin,
If you could hear at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs
Bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,--
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old like: Dulce et decorum est
Prop patria mori.

1. The Latin quotation (27-28), from the

Roman poet Horace, means “It is sweet and
becoming to die for one’s country.” What is
the poem’s comment on this statement?
2. List the elements of the poem that seem not
beautiful and therefore “unpoetic.” Are there
any elements of beauty in the poem?
3. How do the comparisons in lines 1, 14, 20,
and 23-24 contribute to the effectiveness of
the poem?
4. What does the poem gain by moving from
plural pronouns and the past tense to
singular pronouns and the present tense?
Part 2: A Study of Reading Habits
Philip Larkin
The Man He Killed
Thomas Hardy When getting my nose in a book
Cured most things short of school,
Had he and I but met It was worth ruining my eyes
By some old ancient inn, To know I could still keep cool,
We should have sat us down to wet And deal out the old right hook
Right many a nipperkin!1 To dirty dogs twice my size.

But ranged as infantry Later, with inch-thick specs,

And staring face to face, Evil was just my lark:
I shot at him as he at me, Me and my cloak and fangs
And killed him in his place. Had ripping times in the dark.
The women I clubbed with sex!
I shot him dead because— I broke them up like meringues.
Because he was my foe,
Just so: my foe of course he was; Don’t read much now: the dude
That’s clear enough; although Who lets the girl down before
The hero arrives, the chap
He thought he’d ‘list, perhaps, Who’s yellow and keeps the store,
Off-hand-like—just as I— Seem far too familiar. Get stewed:
Was out of work—had sold his traps—2 Books are a load of crap.
No other reason why.
1. The three stanzas delineate three stages in
Yes; quaint and curious war is! the speaker’s life. Describe each.
You shoot a fellow down 2. What kind of person is the speaker? What
You’d treat, if met where any bar is, kind of books does he read? May we
Or help to half-a-crown. identify with the poet?
3. Identify several lines with inverted syntax.
half-pint-cup
1. What is the purpose of the inversion? What
belongings
2. is emphasized?
4. How does the plain, matter-of-fact diction of
1. In informational prose, the repetition of a the final lines help to develop the poet’s
world like “because” would be an error. tone?
What purpose does the repetition serve here?
2. Why does the speaker repeat to himself his
“clear” reason for killing a man (10-11)?
3. The word “although” (12) gets more
emphasis that it would ordinarily because it
comes not only at the end of a line but at the
end of a stanza. What purpose does this
emphasis serve?
4. Can the redundancy of “old ancient” (2) be
poetically justified/
5. Poetry has been defined as “the expression
of elevated thought in elevated language.”
Comment on the adequacy of this definition
in the light of Hardy’s poem.
Is my team plowing
A.E. Housman

“Is my team plowing,

That I was used to drive
And hear the harness jingle
When I was alive?”

Aye, the horses trample,

The harness jingles now;
No change though you lie under
The land you used to plow.

“Is football playing

Along the river shore,
With lads to chase the leather,
Now I stand up no more?”

Aye, the ball is flying,

The lads play heart and soul;
The goal stands up, the keeper
Stands up to keep the goal.

“Is my girl happy,

That I thought hard to leave,
And has the tired of weeping
As she lies down at eve?”

Aye, she lies down lightly,

She lies not down to weep:
Your girl is well contented.
Be still, my lad, and sleep.

“Is my friend hearty,

Now I am thin and pine;
And has he found to sleep in
A better bed than mine?”

Yes, lad, I lie easy,

I lie as lads would choose;
I cheer a dead man’s sweetheart,
Never ask me whose.

1. How many actual speakers are there in this poem?

What is meant by “whose” in line 32?
2. Is this poem, cynical in its observation of human
nature?
3. The word “sleep” (24,27) in the concluding stanza
suggest three different meanings. What are they?
How many meanings are suggested by the word bed?
4. What is the theme of this poem? Identify at least
one poetic device that contributes to meaning and
explain how it contributes to meaning.