Poetry Flashcards
(12 cards)
Blessing
Key Themes
Poverty
Water
Religion
Community
Compare with WP
Blessing
Form + structure
Free verse
Structure mimics flow of water
Third person - portraying ideas to audience
Blessing
Key quotes
- “There never is enough water” - unusual grammar places emphasis on “never” - reader has to think about it
- “sometimes the sudden rush of fortune” - sibilance to mimic water and make it frantic. Water is described as currency - rare + highly valued
- “a congregation” - water is a higher being that brings people together. Slight fear of it- perhaps fear of absence of water
- “Small bones” - ending poem with this even though it seemed like it was about water - joy is temporary
War Photographer
Key themes
Power
Ordering in chaos
Religion
Poverty/ war/ conflict
Affect of war on others
Compare with blessing
Questioning why people have to put themselves through hell just to get a small reaction
War Photographer
Form + structure
- Free verse closed structure
- 4 stanzas- 6 lines/stanza
- Regular ABBCDD rhyme- trying to find order in the chaos
- Tone shifts to anger at the end
- Poem follows stages of photography - darkroom, solution, development + publication
- Third person - impassive/ no one understands their pain
- Cyclical
War Photographer
Key quotes
- “Spools of suffering set out in ordered rows” - trying to order the agonising photos so that he doesn’t go mad. He has power over the photos - he is not dead but other people are - portrays regret / guilt
- “As though this were a church and he a priest preparing to intone a mass” - He has power over them. Criticising religion for allowing death? - photos are bodies/ graves?
- “All flesh is grass” - Isaiah 40:6 quote. Futility of war as lives mean nothing - impassive
- “blood stained into a foreign dust” - Everlasting impact of war
- “running children in a nightmare heat” - Worst possible scenario.
- “He stares impassively at where he earns his living and they do not care” - He is impassive because he won’t be able to do his job if he wasn’t. Anger towards people who don’t try and stop the conflict. They is ambiguous. His job is futile - cyclical
Half-past two
Key themes
Isolation
Power
Time
Childhood
Children don’t conform to abstract concepts
Writer portrays how children merge imagination and fear to create fairytales
Criticising teachers who can’t communicate
Compare with H+S
Half-past two
Form + structure
- Free verse closed form - there is freedom within time but it cannot be escaped
- No set rhythm/ rhyme - want to be free from time
- Appeals to nostalgia
- Enjambment mimics the way time merges for him
- Free indirect speech - child is young and innocent and cannot portray his own thoughts
- Writer seperates himself from child - may be older version of them/ Written in third person as they are no longer a child
Half-past two
Key quotes
- “He did Something Very Wrong (I forget what it was)” - Memory of bad thing sticks with the writer (capitalised) but he is too innocent to know what it was or question what it was - trusts the teacher - abuse of power
- “All the important times he knew, But not half-past two” - Important times aren’t actually time - the only thing he needs to know is what he doesn’t. His life is controlled by adults who tell him things he doesn’t understand
- “He knew the clockface, the little eyes and two long legs for walking” - Personification of the clock to portray his childlike views. Teacher has told him the time but not how to tell the time - neglect
- “Out of reach of all the timefors, and knew he’d escaped forever” - His imagination and lack of knowledge allowed him to transcend what is possible. Childhood is magnificent.
- “Into the silent noise his hangnail made” - his imagination made up things that weren’t there. Child is so bored he doesn’t know how to act.
Hide and seek
Key themes
Childhood
Isolation
Nostalgia
Innocence before adulthood
Contradictory feelings towards growing up
Hide and seek
Form + Structure
Free verse
Long stanza shows length of time hidden
Free indirect speech
ABCDD until 21st line - innocence + joy replaced with cruelty
Single stanza shows single childhood
Narrator warning child about not growing up
Hide and seek
Key quotes
- “The sacks in the toolshed smell like the seaside”- sibilance evokes sensory imagery and creates nostalgia
- “You musn’t sneeze when they come prowling in” - zoomorphism makes seekers seem predatory. Seekers are adulthood. Writer warning child to stay far away from adulthood. Them vs us.
- “Don’t breathe. Don’t move. Stay dumb. Hide in your blindness” - another imperative warning. Literal + metaphorical - stay hidden and also continue in your innocence
- “cold bites through your coat; the dark damp smell of sand moves in your throat” - what was previouslt nostalgic is now painful and sinister. Losing childish spark
- “I’ve caught you!”- Predator/Prey switch as they grow up. Child takes over from writer and grow up.
- Anything from ending shows after childhood there is only cruelty. have to personigy things to make it seem less lonely
