Poetry Support

1. Please select from below which statement is correct:
a) Imagery has no connection with the world of sense.
b) Imagery in poetry is just a picture in words.
c) Imagery appeals to one or all of our five senses.

The grain of his wrists
is like bog oak,
the ball of his heel

like a basalt egg.
His instep has shrunk
Cold as a swan's foot
or a wet swamp root.

(From Seamus Heaney's "The Grauballe Man")
(In The Forms of poetry (1990). P. Abbs & J. Richardson. Melbourne: Cambridge University Press.)

2. The seven lines of poetry above contain:
a) a series of metaphors
b) a series of similes
c) a series of personifications

His hips are the ridge
and purse of a mussel,
his spine an eel arrested
under a glisten of mud.

The head lifts,
the chin is a visor
raised above the vent
of his slashed throat

that has tanned and toughened.

(From Seamus Heaney's "The Grauballe Man") (See above)

3. The above nine lines contain:
a) a series of metaphors
b) a series of personifications
c) a mixture of synecdoche and metonymy

Broken Sky
The sky of grey is eaten in six places
Rag holes stand out.
It is an army blanket and the sleeper
Slept too near the fire.

Carl Sandburg
(In Poets and poetry (1992). R.K. Sadler, T.A.S. Hayllar & C.J. Powell (Eds.). Macmillan Educational:Melbourne.)

4. The above poem, "Broken Sky" is an example of:
a) a personification
b) an example of a sustained metaphor
c) an example of metonymy

Cargoes
Quinquireme of Nineveh from distant Ophir
Rowing home to haven in sunny Palestine,
With a cargo of ivory
And apes and peacocks,
Sandalwood, cedarwood, and sweet white wine.

Stately Spanish galleon coming from the Isthmus,
Dipping through the Tropics by the palm-green shores,
With a cargo of diamonds,
Emeralds, amethysts,
Topazes, and cinnamon, and gold moidores.

Dirty British coaster with a salt-caked smoke stack
Butting through the Channel in the mad March days,
With a cargo of Tyne coal,
Road-rail, pig-lead,
Firewood, ironware, and cheap tin trays.

John Masefield
(In The Four Corners (1968). A.K. Thomson (Ed.). The Jacaranda Press: Brisbane.)

5. The above poem with its three distinct pictures of three different kinds of ships is an example of:
a) sensory appeal made through the poet's use of figures of speech
b) sensory appeal made through the poet's use of straight description.

The Wind
The wind stood up and gave a shout;
He whistled on his fingers, and

Kicked the withered leaves about,
And thumped the branches with his hand,

And said he'd kill, and kill, and kill;
And so he will! And so he will!

James Stephens
(In Poetry An Introduction (1981). R. Miller & R.A. Greenberg (Eds.). St Martin's Press:New York.)

6. The above poem on "The Wind" is an example of:
a) a sustained metaphorn
b) a sustained personification
c) a sustained hyperbole

With how sad steps, O moon, thou climb'st the skies.

(From Sir Philip Sidney's "Astrophel and Stella")
(In The Progress of poetry (1965). C.J. Horne & M. O'Brien (Eds.). Heinemann:Melbourne.)

7. The above quotation is an example of:
a) synecdoche
b) metonymy
c) apostrophe

The Hand that signed the Paper
The hand that signed the paper felled a city;
Five sovereign fingers taxed the breath,
Doubled the globe of dead and halved a country;
These five kings did a king to death.

Excerpt from Dylan Thomas' "The Hand that signed the Paper")
(In Seven Centuries of poetry in English (1991) (rev.ed.) J. Leonard (Ed.). Oxford University Press:Melbourne.)

8. The above stanza of Dylan Thomas contains an example of:
a) sustained synecdoche
b) sustained metonymy
c) sustained personification

Ode
How sleep the brave who sink to rest
By all their country's wishes blest!
When Spring, with dewy fingers cold,
Returns to deck their hallowed mould,
She there shall dress a sweeter sod
Than Fancy's feet have ever trod.

(Except from William Collins' "Ode" written in the beginning of the year 1746)
(In Poetry An Introduction (1981). R. Miller & R.A. Greenberg (Eds.). St Martin's Press:New York.)

9. The phrase, "the brave" as used in the above stanza is an example of:
a) personification
b) metonymy
c) synecdoche

Not all the waters in the rude rough sea
Can wash the balm from an annointed King.

Shakespeare, Richard 11 3.2.54)
(In The Tragedy of King Richard the Second (1970). (rev.ed.) M.W. Black (Ed.). Penguin Books:Baltimore, Md.)

10. The above quotation from Richard 11 is an example of:
a) personification
b) hyperbole
c) metonymy

La Belle Dame Sans Merci
I see a lily on thy brow
   With anguish moist and fever dew,
And on thy cheeks a fading rose
   Fast withered too.

(From John Keats' "La Belle Dame Sans Merci")
(In The Progress of Poetry (1965). C.J. Horne & M. O'Brien (Eds.) Heinemann:Melbourne.)

11. Keats is using the lily and the rose in the above stanza as:
a) metaphors
b) personifications
c) symbols

Poem (As the cat)

As the cat
climbed over
the top of

the jamcloset
first the right
forefoot

carefully
then the hind
stepped down

into the pit of
the empty
flowerpot.

William Carlos Williams
(In Poetry An Introduction (1981). R. Miller & R.A. Greenberg (Eds.) St Martin's Press:New York.)

12. The word, "jamcloset" in the above poem is being used by Williams in a:
a) denotative way
b) connotative way
c) both denotatively and connotatively

13. The word, "pit" in the above poem is being used by Williams in a:
a) denotative way
b) connotative way
c) both denotatively and connotatively

I wake and feel the fell of dark, not day.
What hours, O what hours we have spent
This night! What sights you, heart, saw; ways you went!

(From Gerard Manly Hopkins' "I wake and feel the fell of dark")
(In Gerard Manley Hopkins Poetry and Prose (1953). W.H. Gardner (Ed.). Penguin Books: Ringwood, Victoria.)

14. In the above extract how is Hopkins using the word, "fell"?
a) denotatively
b) connotatively
c) both connotatively and denotatively

Eletelephony
Once there was an elephant,
Who tried to use the telephant-
No! No! I mean an elephone
Who tried to use the telephone-
(Dear me! I am not certain quite
That even now I've got it right).

Howe'er it was, he got his trunk
Entangled in the telefunk.
The more he tried to get it free,
The louder buzzed the telephee-
(I fear I'd better drop the song
of elephop and telephong!

Laura Richards
(In The Oxford Book of Children's verse (1973). I. & P. Opie (Eds.). Clarendon Press:Oxford, England.)

15. The nonsense style of the above poem is achieved with the use of:
a) repetition
b) invention of words
c) exaggeration

I know no sleep you do not stand beside me.
You footless darkness following where I go,
you lipless drinker at my drowsy breast-
yet whom I must deny I have denied.
The unpossessing is the unpossessed.

(From Judith Wright's "The Unborn")
(In Five Senses Selected poems (1963) Judith Wright. Angus & Roberston:Sydney.)

16. The above extract from Judith Wright's poem contains an example of:
a) hyperbole
b) metaphor
c) apostrophe

I saw a Jolly Hunter
I saw a jolly hunter
     With a jolly gun
Walking in the country
     In the jolly sun.

In the jolly meadow
     Sat a jolly hare.
Saw the jolly hunter.
     Took jolly care.
Hunter jolly eager -
     Sight of jolly prey.
Forgot gun pointing
     Wrong jolly way.

Jolly hunter jolly head
     Over heels gone.
Jolly old safety-catch
     Not jolly on.

Bang went the jolly gun.
     Hunter jolly dead.
Jolly hare got clean away.
     Jolly good, I said.

       R.I.J.P.

Charles Causley
(In New Poetry Workshop (1983). N. Russell & H.J. Chatfield (Eds.). Nelson:Melbourne.)

17. The satire that is achieved in the above poem relies heavily on the use of:
a) onomatopoeia
b) repetition
c) euphony

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,
And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveller, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth.

(From Robert Frost's "The Road not taken")
(In Poets and Poetry (1992). R.K. Sadler, T.A.S. Hayllar & E.J. Powell (Eds.) Macmillan Educational:Melbourne.)

18. Frost has used the repetition of "and":
a) to emphasise a point
b) simply to bind the ideas together
c) to enhance the description

Score = /18
Correct answers: