Name: _________________________________
Date: _________________________
HR: ___________________________________
Teacher: ______________________
SWBAT review poetry terms and the process of analyzing a poem.
Poetry is ______________________________________
Poetry is ______________________________________
Poetry is ______________________________________
Poetry Big 4
1. Read (remember to go slowly and read it like a poem)
2. Summarize Stanzas (who is the speaker and what is
literally happening?)
3. Find Poetic Devices (alliteration, metaphor,
personification, simile, onomatopoeia, rhyme and rhyme scheme,
symbolism, use of linebreaks or stanzas and any lines with *red flashing
lights*)
4.Message or main idea
Poetry Big 4
First Lesson
By Philip Booth
Lie back, daughter, let your head
be tipped back in the cup of my hand.
Gently, and I will hold you. Spread
your arms wide, lie out on the stream
and look high at the gulls. A deadman’s-float is face down. You will dive
and swim soon enough where this tidewater
ebbs to the sea. Daughter, believe
me, when you tire on the long thrash
to your island, lie up, and survive.
As you float now, where I held you
and let go, remember when fear
cramps your heart what I told you:
lie gently and wide to the light-year
stars, lie back, and the sea will hold you.
Read
Summarize Stanzas
Find Poetic Devices
Message or main idea
1. Who is the speaker in the poem? _______________________________
2. Who is the speaker addressing in the poem? _____________________________
3. How many lines does the poem have? _______________
4. Go back and number the lines correctly in the poem.
5. Is there a rhyme scheme to the poem First Lesson? ___________________________
6. Which type of figurative language is featured in the poem?
a.
b.
c.
d.
Simile
Metaphor
Alliteration
Personification
7. What two things are being compared in this poem?
is being compared to
8. Which of the following words best describes the tone in the poem?
a. loving
b. fearful
c. joking
d. stern
9. In your own words describe what is literally happening in the poem First Lesson.
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10. What is the message or main idea of the poem?
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Execution
By Edward Hirsch
5
10
15
20
25
30
The last time I saw my high school football coach
He had cancer stenciled into his face
Like pencil marks from the sun, like intricate
Drawings on the chalkboard, small x’s and o’s
That he copied down in a neat numerical hand
Before practice in the morning. By day’s end
The board was a spiderweb of options and counters,
Blasts and sweeps, a constellation of players
Shining under his favorite word, Execution,
Underlined in the upper right-hand corner of things.
He believed in football like a new religion
Of blocking and tackling, the idea of warfare
Without suffering or death, the concept of teammates
Moving in harmony like the planets—and yet
Our awkward adolescent bodies were always canceling
The flawless beauty of Saturday afternoons in September,
The clear weather, the ideal game he imagined.
And so he drove us through punishing drills
On weekday afternoons, and doubled our practice time,
And challenged us to hammer him with forearms,
And devised elaborate, last-second plays—a fleaFlicker, a triple reverse—to save us from defeat.
Almost always they worked. He despised losing
And loved winning more than his own body, maybe even
More than himself. But the last time I saw him
He looked wobbly and stunned by illness,
And I remembered the game in my senior year
When we met a downstate team who loved hitting
More than we did, who battered us all afternoon
With a vengeance, who destroyed us with timing
And power, with deadly, impersonal authority,
Machine-like fury, perfect execution.
1. What does the speaker mean when he says that his old coach had “cancer stenciled into his
face”?
a. He looked weak with disease
b. He told the speaker he was sick
c. He had scars from surgery
d. He had already lost his battle
2. Based on the poem why was the coach’s favorite word “execution”?
a. He wants his players to methodically beat their opponent with carefully planned plays
b. He teaches the boys to play rough and tackle the other team to hurt them
c. He is a violent man whose focus is solely to defeat any obstacles he encounters
d. He tries to be funny and make a joke out of the fact that the boys are not good athletes
3. Which of the following words best describes the coach?
a.
b.
c.
d.
Fragile
Egotistical
Sympathetic
Driven
4. Why does the speaker remember the game from senior year when he sees his old coach?
a. It was a well-known game that the speaker was still embarrassed about
b. The loss of the game mirrored the loss of the coach’s battle with cancer
c. The coach never forgave the players for losing so badly to the downstate team
d. The speaker and coach discuss the best and worst games whenever they see each other
5. Which of the following best describes the mood of this poem?
a. Sorrowful
b. Joyous
c. Fearful
d. Angry
6. Why is the poem most likely titled “Execution”?
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