Step 1: Take a look at your poems and read/think about the information below. Jot down anything you happen to notice in your notebooks.
Line breaking:
Speed: Short or long? Enjambed or end-stopped?
Sound: Rhyme emphasized? Emphasize or de-emphasize rhythm?
Syntax: Does the poem have line breaks that are compatible with its syntactical units? Where are prepositions placed--at the beginning or end? If the line breaks are unconventional, what is the effect?
Surprise: When a line breaks at an unexpected place, what is the effect? What is the strongest position for a word?
Sense: Do the line breaks add to the overall meaning or sense of the poem? Do they further its argument (logical or sound sense)?
Space: Do the line breaks represent the timing of the poem? What do you gather about the poem based on its appearance? Does the creation of stanzas organize the space of the poem?
| |||||||||||||||||||||||
Step 3: Reactions to Stafford's poem? Post! Step 4: If time permits, write a poem to work with on the Baggage Switch Exercise. You may also use a poem you have already written. The experience should be valuable and authentic. | |||||||||||||||||||||||
Step 5: Baggage Switch Exercise:
Make a list of all the verbs used in one of your poems.
Swap your list with a partner.
Replace the verbs in your poem with some verbs from the list you receive. You can change the tense and number.
DO NOT MERELY CHOOSE SYNONYMS. LOOK FOR SURPRISING JUXTAPOSITIONS. FOCUS ON WORD CHOICE (DICTION)!
Step 6: Turn in all homework!
Possible quiz Friday or Tuesday. Any information presented in class is fair game.
Angela Rollins
ReplyDeleteAh! I actually know this poem! I think it was in one of Craddock's classes that I read it... Either way, I distinctly remember the last stanza, and more precisely the last line. It's what one of those things that have stuck with me for a long time, I just didn't remember where it came from. I really like the poem - and the line breaking reminds me of how I use line breaks in my own poetry. The idea of the river really pulls the poem together... I also like how it's very short and more like a few sentences than a poem. This is also how I write me own poetry! Yay William Stafford!
At first, I thought there was more to William Stafford’s Ask Me, but mostly because I thought the white thing next to it was a scrollbar. And usually, poems are long and boring. I am not a fan of poems, but hey, Stafford’s got something going on in his poems. I assume we’re supposed to comment on the line-breaking since the post today is about that. Stafford’s got some enjambment going on and his lines are about medium-length. It’s sort of medium paced, the lines breaks in some weird places. Weird meaning something like something I’m not exactly used to. I mean, it’s effective, though, I guess. I have to take time to go from the end of one line to the beginning of the next which is all just one sentence that’s supposed to be together. It’s different. Well, not in poetry, but when all you keep reading is fiction, yes. Both stanzas are also about the same size and the lines are all pretty uniform, so I mean, I’ve seen poems like C.K. Williams’ which have lines that are super long and pretty different. And I mean, the enjambment isn’t always there, sometimes Stafford ends a line with a period, and it sort of switches back and forth with some variety.
ReplyDeleteI really like the concept of this poem, but I don’t agree with all of the line breaks. For example:
ReplyDelete“what I have done is my life. Others
have come in their slow way into”
I don’t think that the line break after others was the best place because I don’t find it adding emphasis or assisting with a more appealing sound or rhythm. However, I did like
“my thought, and some have tried to help
or to hurt: ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made.”
I think the line breaks in this section are done beautifully, and the emphasis on “or to hurt” and the last line of the first stanza are important.
Again in the second stanza, I find there are line breaks that I would’ve changed, had I written this poem, such as:
“You and I can turn and look
at the silent river and wait. We know”
I wouldn’t have ended the second line of this stanza at look, I would’ve had “at” on that line and continued the next line with “the.” The rest of the poem is beautifully done, though, and I really felt that the line breaks help with the flow of the piece.
I like William Stafford’s use of end-stop in the first line of the second stanza and the last line – it helps break up the poem, which uses enjambment.
Briyanna Brinkley
ReplyDeleteIt was an interesting poem for the most part, I’m not sure if we were supposed to comment on the line breaking of the poem. But that name Stafford sounds familiar but I’m not sure where I’ve heard it though. I was a tad bit confused in the beginning but I realized I was reading too fast. I like the line “Ask me whether what I have done is my life.” I’m not sure why I just do, but overall all it was an interesting poem.
This poem is awkward to me, because of the places in which William Stafford breaks his lines. It's completely random, which is extremely annoying. I do like the purpose of this poem though. The contrast between love and hate is really powerful in this poem. I dig it.
ReplyDeleteI also thought what My did, that the white bar was a scrollbar, but when I found that it wasn't then I actually began to think about the poem. I really liked the first sentence, because it set the stage for what was to come. I ound that at first, I had no idea what he was talking about but as the poem progressed, I understood more and more. I think that the place whee he broke the poem into two stanzas was a good choice, because it added a moment of importance on the love and hate line. Which is the line that I think most adds to the poem because of its strong emotions. Overall, I liked the poem, but it wasn't one of my absolute favorites.
ReplyDeleteI really enjoyed the poem and the sentence formatting that he used. I especially love the last stanza, i think that i flows beautifully. I generally dislike line breaks similar to the way he breaks things, but oddly, with this poem i actually like it. Also, i love the length of the poem. I prefer shorter poems, so this poem really worked for me.
ReplyDeleteMy two favorite lines were:
"ask me what difference
their strongest love or hate has made."
and
"What the river says, that is what I say."
I enjoyed this poem. I am unfamiliar with Stafford's writing,but based on this poem I think I would enjoy it. I like how he focused on one image the entire poem, as opposed to pulling up more than one to explain each statement. The river was an effective image, as well as an appropriate metaphor with the meaning of the poem. Passing time, and currents, stillness and the unknown. The line breaks were strange sometimes, and I think that at some points it clouded the meaning of the poem, and made the sentence unclear. At the same time, the lack of clarity from the line breaks could add to the overall image of the poem, mirroring the uncertain stillness of the river. Like Angela, the last stanza, and particularly the last line, of the poem stood out to me. The last line was perfect, and ended the poem on a perfect tone. For me that made the whole rest of the poem great, regardless of any confusion, intentional or unintentional.
ReplyDeleteGracie Elliott
I really like this William Stafford poem. It is short yet powerful and effective, with wonderful imagery. The lines are broken up beautifully, streaming down the page like the river of life we all experience, like the river in this poem. It is an excellent example of good enjambment, keeping a good, quick pace that allows the poem to breathe, never falling under the weight of its own ambitions. I agree with Angela: I really love that last line. I hadn't read it before, but it's really lovely, a sort of simultaneous epigram and manifesto on life. I love the imgarey of the silent river with the invisible current, held in place by what is going on miles around it. I also really enjoy when poems are written in this first-person style, as if they are talking directly to us. When Stafford says "you and I can turn and look / at the silent river and wait" we are right there with him. We are looking at that same silent river with him, the poem offering its pearls of wisdom and clarity, perhaps the best thing a poem can do.
ReplyDeleteStafford’s poem reminds me of a lot of my own. They are usually short and divided into two or three stanzas of about the same length. The lines are somewhat short, which speeds up the poem. One thing he does that I do not is use punctuation in the middle of a line. I feel like it makes it more confusing and interrupts the pace. Ignoring the way the poem was constructed, I thought it was actually good writing. His syntax and diction is what made the poem. I didn’t understand the first stanza when I read it, but the second stanza sums up the poem, which is probably what it should do. The line that stuck out the most to me was “We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us.” Yes, nice line.
ReplyDeleteI'm feeling this poem. It's nice! although I don't really agree with some of the line breaks. I felt they could have either fit a word or two together or put an extra word into the next line, if i sadi that correctly. But other than that the poem's good. I's one of the poems you listen to buy a more dark person whose experienced more pain and breakthoughs than the average person. Those "I live in the moment" type people, you know. But that's just my perspective. I'm pretty sure it was supposed to be motivational and inspiring to us. But then again, which poem isn't?
ReplyDeleteThe first line, “Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made,” caught my attention. This line as well as others suggests that the speaker has hidden thoughts and secrets like the river has ice and hidden currents. There are things about this speaker that no one knows, and he or she tell the reader that they can ask them about these unknown things. “Are comings and goings from miles away that hold the stillness exactly before us. What the river says, that is what I say.” In other words the speaker is constantly going through emotions and phases and yet stays the same on the outside. They put up a front and cover what they are actually feeling. The speaker doesn’t reveal these secrets until asked; in this case he’s expecting the reader to interrogate him.
ReplyDelete-Ashley Lawson
This poem is confusing. I don’t really grasp the concept or the overall message of this poem. In my opinion there are a lot of good comparisons that are made in the poem that can help to comprehend it a little more. The first line, “Some time when the river is ice ask me mistakes I have made. “ That was a confusing way to start the poem in my opinion. At first I took the poem in a literal sense and didn’t try to look at a deeper meaning of the poem. Once I read the poem a second and then I third time, I got a better image of what the poem was trying to portray in my head. I could see the hidden current under the frozen ice. “We know the current is there, hidden; and there are comings and goings from miles away…” The image of currents flowing from miles away under the hidden rivers was the immediate image that I got in my head. At first glance this poem didn’t make any sense and I was just taking the words literally, but after reading the poem a few more times I got a better and more clear image in my head of what the poem was really about.
ReplyDeletePersonally, I enjoyed the poem, “Ask Me,” by William Stafford. One aspect of the poem that I really liked is how the author grouped the poem into two stanzas rather than separating the lines. This was effective to me because I was able to appreciate the contrast of the first stanza stating questions to ask whereas the second stanza contrasts by listening to the answers rather than asking them. I also noticed that the lines in this poem are neither long nor short, but are medium in size. They are also enjambed rather than end-stopped, which I think was a good quality to have in this poem when crafting it. This quality seemed to help the poem have a better flow and I think that if the author had went in the opposite direction and used the characteristic of end stopped instead than it wouldn’t have sounded as well as it does. I also think that this characteristic of the poem is significant because I think that that is how questions and answers occur; they are continuous and sometimes never ending.
ReplyDeleteThis poem has a very solid appearance in terms of how it is composed. The poem uses heavy enjambment without elongating the poem. It stresses a sort of honesty or sincerity, as if this poem were more like a letter or request for the subject. I agree with the comments above about how the idea of the river strings the whole thing together; it becomes not a formal request but a poem. I recognized Stafford's name but the poem itself was not familiar to me but overall it was something I enjoyed looking at.
ReplyDeleteI liked the concept of the whole thing but like everyone else, the line breaks are pretty annoying. They just looked like two paragraphs bunched together so it's a little bit hard to understand. The poem is pretty cool though. Maybe he left the line breaks like that for symbolism or something. I don't know but theres a reason for everything, right? Things like this happen in life so i guess its pretty relevant to some.
ReplyDeleteI did not enjoy the poem. It seemed very simple and sort of bland. Perhaps it is too early to analyze a poem. Anyway the line breaks don't annoy me as much as the previous comment, but it is bunched up and not very aesthetically pleasing.
ReplyDeleteI liked the poem "Ask Me" by William Stafford. I did not love the poem "Ask Me" by William Stafford. The language was simple and accessible, as was the poem--perhaps due to the length and brevity of the lines--but the poem as a whole did not leave me in awe and did not raise any questions for me. The line breaks did not seem unique and did not add much to the poem in terms of the meaning--in fact, Stafford mainly breaks his lines after words that don't hold much weight: pronouns, "whether," "know," and "there." The line break I found the most interesting was the line "some have tried to help/or to hurt." This line is made interesting by the juxtapostition of two antithetical ideas: to help and to hurt, and this antithesis is enhanced by the line break. I agree with Taylor that other line breaks are awkward, especially "Others/have come in their slow way into.”
ReplyDelete