Notes and Questions on Walt Whitman's Poem "Reconciliation"

1. In a free verse or "open form" poem, regular rhythm and meter should not be expected. However, rhythmical effects will occur, since English is an accentual language, and since such effects are an element that helps define a poet and a poem. (A) Scan -- that is, do a scansion or analysis of prosody -- of the poem's first line. How are stresses piled up in the first three words? How does this rhythmical effect help set up the following notion: the emphatic rhythmical effect in the first three lines helps stress or convey the emphatic importance of the "word over all"; why is this "word" (see the hint in study question 3 by R&J of what the word is) so important to the speaker and to the themes of the poem? (B) Following up the general direction in R&J study question 1, how is the brevity of line 1, the poem's shortest line, appropriate to the content of the line, and how is the lengthiness of line 3 (so long that it has to be run over to the next line of type, as signaled by the indention; the line thus runs from "That" through "world") appropriate to its content? What key word or words in each line relates in some meaningful way to brevity or shortness (line 1) or lengthiness (line 3), respectively?

2. How is the alliteration on the s-sound in line 3 (note that "s-sound" has to be emphasized, since the sound may be conveyed by a letter other than s, as happens in line 3) appropriate to the content of the line?

3. (A) Though the poem has a serious subject, it contains a pun, which may be found in "over all" (line 1). What two meanings can "over all" have, referring to importance and to the actual typography of the poem? (B) How does the simile of "beautiful as the sky" (line 1) have a directional pointer that relates to the two meanings of "over all" (line 1)?

4. How might the grammar of the poem as a single sentence be related to the poem's ideas or content?
 

Notes and Questions on George Herbert's Poem "Easter Wings"

1. Some students need amplification of the excellent study questions by R&J on this poem. (A1) How do the poem's shape and title correspond to two dominant extended metaphors in the poem (rising vs. falling; flying)? (A2) In what lines, and how, are the extended metaphors used, which are mentioned in A1?

2. Another dominant extended metaphor in the poem is expansion vs. contraction. (A1) In what lines, and how, is this extended metaphor used? (A2) How does this extended metaphor accord with the poem's visual shape?

3. How are all the components of the poem related to the holiday of Easter?
 

Notes and Questions on e.e. cummings' Poem "Buffalo Bill's/ defunct"

1. Cummings preferred to sign his name or have his poems attributed to his name without capital letters. Some people think, mistakenly, that Cummings (or cummings) never used capital letters. (A1) How does this poem prove the belief in Cummings' exclusive use of lowercase incorrect? (A2) What themes or ideas are conveyed by capitalization in the poem?

2. Cummings is celebrated for special effects with words and punctuation marks and typography. See his other poems in R&J, "in Just-" (Ch. 21) and "she being Brand / -new" (Ch. 18). (Remember that additional literary works in every chapter in R&J are organized alphabetically by surname of the author.) For an amusing film occurrence of "she being Brand / -new" (cf. the film occurrence of Dylan Thomas's "Do Not Go Gentle" in the Rodney Dangerfield comedy Back to School), check out the video of the film Plain Clothes. Ponder the excellent study questions in R&J about the poem.

3. (A) To the excellent study question 2 of R&J on the poem, add the following: what is the scansion (pattern of stressed or unstressed syllables) in "onetwothreefourfive" and "pigeonsjustlikethat" (line 6)? What was Buffalo Bill actually doing in the Wild West show that caused the pigeons to break, and how does sound echo sense here? How is the running together of the words relevant to the implied action by Buffalo Bill? (B) How does the alliteration of the s-sound in lines 4-5 help convey anything about their content?

4. Some poems such as George Herbert's "Easter Wings," William Heyen's "Mantle," John Hollander's "Swan and Shadow," May Swenson's "Women," and Charles Webb's "The Shape of History" (all in Ch. 20 of R&J) have an attention-getting visual shape, which evokes the question about how the shape relates to the poem's ideas and content. (Such poems, dating from ancient Greek poetry, are variously called "concrete poetry," "shaped poetry" or "shaped poems," "carmen figuratem," "pattern poetry" or "pattern verse," "figure poems," "calligrammes," or "altar poems" [this last item, with reference to George Herbert's poem "The Altar"].) In other poems, such as Cummings' "Buffalo Bill's / defunct," a visual or pictorial shape may be present that is subtler than the definite "shaped poem," yet still meaningful or significant. (A1) What pictorial form seems to emerge, when the following units are considered: lines 1-5 ("Buffalo" through "stallion"), 6-7 ("and" through "Jesus"), 8-9 ("he" through "is"), and 10-11 ("how" through "Death")? (A2) What repeated pictorial pattern is left incomplete in lines 10-11, and how is this incompleteness related to the content of the lines as well as the poem's overall themes or ideas?