Genetics

Question 1

What is the structure of this poem?

Answer 1

Villanelle- lyrical poem of 19 lines with only 2 rhymes throughout, ending in a quantrain - creates a sense of seperation & togetherness through tercets

Question 2

What is the complex interlacing of rhyme and form mirror?

Answer 2

It mirrors the complexity of our own genetics and DNA

Question 3

What is the speaker contemplating in this poem?

Answer 3

Contemplating the seperation of her parents and their togetherness - embodied through her

Question 4

‘My father’s in my fingers, but my mother’s in my palms’

Answer 4

Synecdoche to show she is an embodiment of her parents relationship- hands represent parents union engraved in speaker.

Question 5

‘ I lift them up and look at them with pleasure -‘

Answer 5

Speaker is awe-struck/fascinated towards her parents marriage. Dramatic pause is emphatic of speakers deep sense of joy at her parents togetherness.

Question 6

‘I know’ ‘they may’

Answer 6

1. joy at certainity of being the combination parents marriage
2. juxtapostion - fickle nature vs certainity of love

Question 7

‘been repelled to seperate lands, to seperate hemispheres’

Answer 7

Caesura + asyndetic listing emphatic of separation/physical distance between former partners. ‘repelled’ - opposing forces, irreversible divide

Question 8

‘quarry for their marriage of love’

Answer 8

metaphor - parents struggle to recognise who they once were

Question 9

‘chapel where a steeple stands’

Answer 9

assonance -disjointed connection - childhood finger game / stability?

Question 10

‘my father’s by my fingers, my mother’s by my palms’ linked with childhood game

Answer 10

attempt to recapture childhood innocence and joy of past relationship

Question 11

What device is used in ‘my body is their marriage register’?

Answer 11

Metaphor - speaker is a physical representation/document of their marriage

Question 12

What device is used in ‘the skin’s demands’?

Answer 12

Personification - human body is almost a force beyond human comprehension as it has its own desires

Question 13

What device is used in ‘I’ll bequeath my fingers, if you bequeath your palms’?

Answer 13

Parallel phrasing suggestive of the couples harmonious partnership - juxtaposition top 1st line - similarity almost creates a cyclical structure whereby child follows in parents footpath

Question 14

What is the structure of this poem?

Answer 14

Villanelle - lyric poem of 19 lines with only 2 rhymes throughout ending in a quantrain, sense of separation and togetherness through tercets and repeating rhyme