Tutorial of Initiation to Poetry PDF

## TUTORIAL OF INITIATION TO POETRY ### General Objective: Identify forms and characteristics of English poetry ### WORK SHEET 1: Aesthetics of the poetic text **Objective:** describe the poem as a celebration of beauty "The Painter," John Ashbery Sitting between the sea and the buildings He e...

## TUTORIAL OF INITIATION TO POETRY ### General Objective: Identify forms and characteristics of English poetry ### WORK SHEET 1: Aesthetics of the poetic text **Objective:** describe the poem as a celebration of beauty "The Painter," John Ashbery Sitting between the sea and the buildings He enjoyed painting the sea's portrait But just as children imagine a prayer Is merely silence, he expected his subject To rush up the sand, and, seizing a brush, Plaster its own portrait on the canvas. So there was never any paint on his canvas Until the people who lived in the buildings Put him to work: "Try using the brush As a means to an end. Select, for a portrait, Something less angry and large, and more subject To a painter's moods, or, perhaps, to a prayer." How could he explain to them his prayer That nature, not art, might usurp the canvas? He chose his wife for a new subject, Making her vast, like ruined buildings, As if, forgetting itself, the portrait Had expressed itself without a brush. Slightly encouraged, he dipped his brush In the sea, murmuring a heartfelt prayer: "My soul, when I paint this next portrait Let it be you who wrecks the canvas." The news spread like wildfire through the buildings: He had gone back to the sea for his subject. Imagine a painter crucified by his subject! Too exhausted even to lift his brush, He provoked some artists leaning from the buildings To malicious mirth: "We haven't a prayer Now, of putting ourselves on canvas, Or getting the sea to sit for a portrait!" Others declared it a self-portrait Finally all indications of a subject Began to fade, leaving the canvas Perfectly white. He put down the brush. At once a howl, that was also a prayer, Arose from the overcrowded buildings. They tossed him, the portrait, from the tallest of the buildings; And the sea devoured the canvas and the brush As though his subject had decided to remain a prayer. NO WORD IS IDLE OR ACCIDENTAL. EACH WORD HAS A SPECIFIC PLACE WITHIN AN OVERARCHING PATTERN. ### WORK SHEET 2: The Sonnet as a major type in traditional poetry **Objective:** Distinguish the two types of sonnet in English poetry **Poem 1:** "That time of year thou mayst in me behold," William Shakespeare That time of year thou mayst in me behold When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang Upon those boughs which shake against the cold, Bare ruined choirs where late the sweet birds sang. In me thou seest the twilight of such day As after sunset fadeth in the west, Which by and by black night doth take away, Death's second self, that seals up all in rest. In me thou seest the glowing of such fire That on the ashes of his youth doth lie, As the deathbed whereon it must expire, Consumed with that which it was nourished by. This thou perceiv'st, which makes thy love more strong, To love that well which thou must leave ere long. **Poem 2:** "Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent's Narrow Room," by William Wordsworth Nuns fret not at their convent's narrow room; And hermits are contented with their cells; And students with their pensive citadels; Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom, Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom, High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells, Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells: In truth the prison, unto which we doom Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me, In sundry moods, 'twas pastime to be bound Within the Sonnet's scanty plot of ground; Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be) Who have felt the weight of too much liberty, Should find brief solace there, as I have found. THE TRADITIONAL ORGANIZATION OF POETRY CONSISTS OF THE BASIC STANZA OF FOUR LINES. THE FIRST TYPE OF SONNET, OF THREE QUATRAINS AND A COUPLET, IS CALLED AN ENGLISH OR SHAKESPEAREAN SONNET. THE SECOND TYPE, ORGANIZED IN ONE OCTAVE AND A SESTET, IS CALLED AN ITALIAN OR PETRARCHAN SONNET. ### WORK SHEET 3: Diction **Objective:** Define the term diction in English Poetry "Baptism," by Claude McKay Into the furnace let me go alone; Stay you without in terror of the heat. I will go naked in--for thus "tis sweet-- Into the weird depths of the hottest zone. I will not quiver in the frailest bone, You will not note a flicker of defeat; My heart shall tremble not its fate to meet, My mouth give utterance to any moan. The yawning oven spits forth fiery spears; Red aspish tongues shout wordlessly my name. Desire destroys, consumes my mortal fears, Transforming me into a shape of flame. I will come out, back to your world of tears, A stronger soul within a finer frame. DICTION IS THE SELECTION OF INDIVIDUAL WORDS CONVEYING THE WORD'S MEANING AS WELL AS ITS LEVEL OR TYPE. IN THIS EXAMPLE, THE DICTION IS BITTER. ### WORK SHEET 4: Syntax **Objective:** Identify the syntax as a distinct feature of poetry **Poem 1:** "I(a," by E. E. Cummings I(a le af fa || s) one iness THE WAY THE POETIC LINE WORKS DEPENDS UPON MANY STRUCTURES, INCLUDING THE SYNTAX. IN E. E. CUMMINGS' POEM "I(a," THE SYNTAX DISPLAYED THROUGH A PARTICULAR FORM CONVEYS THE MEANING OF THE POEM: THE SYMBOLIC FALL OF THE LEAF MEANS SOLITUDE, DEGENERATION, OR DEATH. **Poem 2:** "Paradise Lost," Book I, John Milton (1674) Of Man's First Disobedience, and the Fruit Of that Forbidden Tree, whose mortal tast Brought Death into the World, and all our woe, With loss of Eden, till one greater Man Restore us, and regain the blissful Seat, Sing Heav'nly Muse, that on the secret top Of Oreb, or of Sinai, didst inspire That Shepherd, who first taught the chosen Seed, In the Beginning how the Heav'ns and Earth Rose out of Chaos: or if Sion Hill Delight thee more, and Siloa's brook that flow'd Fast by the Oracle of God; I thence Invoke thy aid to my adventrous Song, That with no middle flight intends to soar Above th' Aonian Mount, while it pursues Things unattempted yet in Prose or Rhime. THIS POEM IS STRUCTURED THROUGH A SERIES OF ENJAMBMENT, OR RUN-ON LINE. IT DESCRIBES AN EXCESS OF SYNTAX OVER THE BOUNDARIES OF THE POETIC LINE. ### WORKSHEET 5: Metaphor and Simile **Objective:** Distinguish the two expressions of comparison. E.g. "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud," by William Wordsworth (1770-1850), I wandered lonely as a cloud That floats on high o'er vales and hills, When all at once I saw a crowd, A host, of golden daffodils; Beside the lake, beneath the trees, Fluttering and dancing in the breeze. Continuous as the stars that shine And twinkle on the milky way, They stretched in never-ending line Along the margin of a bay: Ten thousand saw I at a glance, Tossing their heads in sprightly dance. The waves beside them danced; but they Out-did the sparkling waves in glee: A poet could not but be gay, In such a jocund company: I gazed - and gazed - but little thought What wealth the show to me had brought: For oft, when on my couch I lie, In vacant or in pensive mood, They flash upon that inward eye Which is the bliss of solitude; And then my heart with pleasure fills, And dances with the daffodils. SOMETIMES, THE METAPHOR CAN BE EXTENDED TO PERSONIFICATION ### WORKSHEET 6: Poetic Rhythm **Objective:** Measure the line of poems. "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening", 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 some promises to keep, And miles to go before I sleep, And miles to go before I sleep. VERSIFICATION IS ONE OF THE MAJOR ACTIVITIES CONCERNING THE READING OF POETRY. THE TWO CATEGORIES OF WORDS: LEXICAL AND GRAMMATICAL THE TWO RULES ABOUT THE MEASURE OF THE POETIC LINE.