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Elements of Poetry

Last updated 9 months ago
16 questions
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
By Robert Frost

Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound’s the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.
1

What do you notice about the setting of the poem?

1

What images catch your attention?

1

What emotions do you feel as you read?

maggie and milly and molly and may

E. E. Cummings
1894 –1962

maggie and milly and molly and may
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang
so sweetly she couldn’t remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me)
it’s always ourselves we find in the sea
1

What is the one thing the characters in the poem have in common?

1

Which character has the most interesting experience?

1

What effect does Cummings create with his unusual capitalization and punctuation?

Mother to Son

By Langston Hughes

Well, son, I’ll tell you:
Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
It’s had tacks in it,
And splinters,
And boards torn up,
And places with no carpet on the floor—
Bare.
But all the time
I’se been a-climbin’ on,
And reachin’ landin’s,
And turnin’ corners,
And sometimes goin’ in the dark
Where there ain’t been no light.
So boy, don’t you turn back.
Don’t you set down on the steps
’Cause you finds it’s kinder hard.
Don’t you fall now—
For I’se still goin’, honey,
I’se still climbin’,
And life for me ain’t been no crystal stair.
1

Who is the speaker in the poem?

1

What traits do you notice in that character?

1

What has the character's life been like?

1

What effect does Hughes create with his use of punctuation?

Haiku of a Day
by Jose Juan Tablada
Translated by Samuel Beckett

The brilliant moon working through its web keeps the spider awake.

Sea the black night, the cloud a shell, the moon a pearl.

Tender willow, almost gold, almost amber, almost light. . . .

Although he never stirs from home the tortoise, like a load of furniture, jolts down the path.

The garden is thick with dry leaves: on the trees I never saw so many green, in spring. . . .
1

What were some images that you pictured while reading?

1

What emotions did you feel while reading these haiku?

1

How does Tablada use punctuation for effect in the third stanza?

Homesteaders
By Rosembary Catacalos

They came for the water,
came to its sleeping place
here in the bed of an old sea,
the dream of the water.
They sank hand and tool into
soil where the bubble of springs
gave off hope, fresh and long,
the song of the water.
Babies and crops ripened
where they settled,
where they married their sweat
in the ancient wedding,
the blessing of the water.
They made houses of limestone
and adobe, locked together blocks
descended from shells and coral,
houses of the bones of the water,
shelter of the water.
And they swallowed the life
of the lime in the water,
sucked its mineral up
into their own bones
which grew strong as the water,
the gift of the water.

All along the counties they lay,
mouth to mouth with the water,
fattened in the smile of the water,
the light of the water,
water flushed pure through the
spine and ribs of the birth of life,
the old ocean,
the stone,
the home of the water.
1

What images stand out to you?

1

What words did you notice when you were reading the poem?

1

Water is the primary image in the poem "Homesteaders." How does Catacalos connect that image to the everyday lives of the people in her poem?