Questions tagged [poetry]
literary work in which the expression of feelings and ideas is given intensity by the use of distinctive style and rhythm; poems collectively or as a genre of literature.
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What are the correctness and use cases for two subjects for the same verb?
This is found in Bob Dylan's line:
The Times They Are a-Changin’
I would like to have an educated view on three aspects:
It seems to be an artistic license, an incorrect form of Times are changing. ...
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1
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51
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How to read and interpret the poem lines?
I came across below poetry lines from The Righteous Life: The Very Best of A.P.J. Abdul Kalam book I'm currently reading. I'm not quite used to or familiar with understanding poem lines.
My ...
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Two questions about the 4th verse of "The Star-Spangled Banner"
4th verse of "The Star-Spangled Banner":
O thus be it ever, when freemen shall stand
Between their loved home and the war’s desolation.
Blest with vict’ry and peace, may the Heav’n rescued ...
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0
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Adjectives next to a noun, separated by a comma
Can we add the adjectives of a noun next to it separated by a comma as below in poetry and in general?
eg 1: Her hair, long and shiny, blowing in the wind {..}
eg 2: Your girl, her hair long and ...
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Question about poetic meter（DUM-da DUM-da DUM-da DUM）in a children's book
Recently I've learned something about poetic meter such as iamb and trochee.
And I‘ve known that iamb is consisted of one unstressed syllable and one stressed syllable. The rhythm of it sounds like da-...
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What is the grammar of the following strange sentence by Edgar Poe?
Open here I flung the shutter, when, with many a flirt and flutter,
In there stepped a stately Raven of the saintly days of yore;
I don't understand the meaning but I am interested in the grammar so ...
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3
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"To a mouse" by Robert Burns
I have been fascinated by a poem of Robert Burns "To a mouse" from my childhood.
It is amazingly, heart-breakingly translated to my native language.
When reading the origin, very much of the ...
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When does the long enumeration in this poem starts and ends? [closed]
The Busy Heart by Rupert Brooke
Now that we've done our best and worst, and parted,
I would fill my mind with thoughts that will not rend.
(O heart, I do not dare go empty-hearted)
I'll think of Love ...
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1
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Is spondee itself a spondee?
Are both syllables of "spondee" stressed in English?
(Are there online dictionaries which record secondary stress? I couldn't find any just now...)
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Meaning of "Ample-lapped"
Context: I found a poem by Ben Shahn titled Father and Child, which says:
"Times change:
no longer the virgin
ample-lapped; the child fallen
in it from an adjacent heaven."
And I have never ...
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How to understand "Roses are red" in this context?
I stumbled across this answer on The Workplace, where the OP has done freelancing work but had their remuneration withheld. The answer opened with
Roses are red,
Violets are blue,
Pay me.
Some quick ...
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Is this structure acceptable: "After D comes E."
"After D comes E."
I know that we don't use this structure very often but I see such structures (the subject is preceeded by the verb (...comes E instead of ...E comes), which is completely ...
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A better parody of “traitors, Rattlesnakes and alligators” [closed]
The song "Union Dixie" (the very opposite of "Dixie") sings: "Away down South in the land of traitors, rattlesnakes and alligators. Right away! Come away! Right away! Come ...
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"This raining is falling hard" would it be wrong? or how does it feels for you
I know it is commonly said "This rain is falling hard" but I am working in a poem and "This raining is falling hard" fits perfect with all the metrics and the entire story.
But ...
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Can I say the action noun in this usage
I want to say 'the city is destroyed into ashes' more poetically and uniquely. Can I say 'the city is with destruction into ashes'? More specifically, there's no city because of destruction and just ...
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An English Song/Poetry With Differrent Grammatic Structure
The other day, I have watched the movie King Arthur Legend of the Sword and, in it, there was an energizer song that includes some words and structure with which I am not familiar. Here are the lyrics:...
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“…presume not God to scan” – what does it mean?
I came across a line from the poem An Essay on Man: Epistle II by Alexander Pope, and I don't understand it in terms of grammar and meaning. Could you help me understand it, please? The passage is:
...
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"Try as I like to find the way, I never can get back by day. "
Could you please help me understand the two following sentences:
Try as I like to find the way,
I never can get back by day.
As you can imagine I do understand each word separately, however the ...
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What is the purpose of "that" in "I wonder how close that I came"?
This is from the song "Worthless" by Van Dyke Parks from the movie The Brave Little Toaster.
I once ran the Indy 500
I must confess I'm impressed how I did it
I wonder how close that I came
...
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1
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Using 'late' as a preposition?
Second stanza of The Convergence of the Twain by Thomas Hardy:
Steel chambers, late the pyres
Of her salamandrine fires,
Cold currents thrid, and turn to rhythmic tidal lyres.
Can 'late' be used as ...
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Is "butter on toast" an idiom in English
This is a stanza from Ruskin Bond's poem If Mice Could Roar:
If tortoise could run
And losses be won
And bullies be buttered on toast
I can't understand the phrase bullies be buttered on toast.
By ...
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Meaning of "And held the darkness over day, that night"
I don't understand the meaning of above line. It's from the song Valentine's Day by Linkin Park. I've posted the full verse below:
My insides all turned to ash, so slow
And blew away as I collapsed, ...
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Meaning of a 16th century verse [closed]
What does this verse mean? Do fain and use have archaic meanings here?
When first Amyntas su'd for a Kiss,
My innocent Heart was tender;
That tho‘ I push'd him away from the bliss,
My Eyes declar'd ...
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1
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What is the meaning of poem 'The Road Not Taken'
What is meaning off below lines. I am not able to understand it. Can anyone please explain me.
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I—
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all ...
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and... and... in poetry
Busy Heart, The by Rupert Brooke
Now that we've done our best and worst, and parted,
I would fill my mind with thoughts that will not rend.
(O heart, I do not dare go empty-hearted)
...
- 13.9k
0
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1
answer
30
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Can I make this sentence construction?
For example, I have this phrase:
The dogs bark.
Can I use this intead:
Bark, the dogs.
Is this switch of the verb place used (in poetry for example) or comprehensible?
Thanks :)
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Meaning of 'looking quite blue with the cold of his drive' and 'Ah-kishes'
'Twas General Janus, the first to arrive,
In snow-shoes and gaiters,
Escorted by skaters,
And looking quite blue with the cold of his drive,
See him come in, with his footman Aquarius,
Who presents ...
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"Arrive at the home" or "arrive on the home" in this example?
I am trying to translate a couplet of a famous Urdu poet named Mirza Ghalib. Which proposition should be appropriate for the example given below, at, on, or neither?
O Ghalib, shrubs are growing ...
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What does this quote mean "Call no chain strong, Which holds one rusted link."
What does the quote mean from the poem Protest by Ella Wheeler Wilcox mean?
"Call no chain strong, Which holds one rusted link."?
Here is the section:
Therefore I do protest against the boast
...
0
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1
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Adjectives after nouns
Just in that farthermost angle, where
You see the remains of a winding-stair,
One turret especially high in air
Uprear’d its tall gaunt form;
As if defying the power of Fate, or
...
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What is 'assonance'?
What is the exact definition of the literary device assonance?
This web site Literary Devices explains it as:
Assonance takes place when two or more words, close to one another
repeat the same ...
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Can a parenthesis come between a "to" and its infinitive?
Is it okay for a parenthesis to come between to + infinitive, or should it stay as a one-part whether it's before or after the parenthesis?
I began to, when it left me and disappeared, desire it
...
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How would you interpret the meaning of "green wars" in this poem?
This is the relevant part of the poem I'm gonna ask a question about:
Those who prepare green wars,
wars with gas, wars with fire,
victory with no survivors,
would put on clean clothes
and ...
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2
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"There sat the Shadow fear'd of man"
But where the path we walk'd began
To slant the fifth autumnal slope,
As we descended following Hope,
There sat the Shadow fear'd of man...
(https://www.poetryfoundation.org/...
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I didn't feel like very much
The Poet says
Four o'clock in the afternoon
And I didn't feel like very much.
and, while I have a grasp of the meaning (I know about the idiom "I don't feel like ..." and the context makes ...
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What does it mean to 'pipe'?
On the first poem of his book Songs of Innocence and Experience, William Blake wrote:
Piping down the valleys wild,
piping songs of pleasant glee,
on a cloud I saw a child,
and he ...
user73571
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2
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What does "so much the more thereby" mean?
This is These Are The Clouds, a poem by William Butler Yeats:
THESE are the clouds about the fallen sun,
The majesty that shuts his burning eye:
The weak lay hand on what the strong has ...
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"anything less than whole” [closed]
Hey can someone help me to explain what does "anything less than whole” in this poem by Rupi Kaur mean?
i had to leave
i was tired of
allowing you to
make me feel
anything less
than whole
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Grammar behind "Whatever what is is is what I want."
Here is the poem:
Prayer, by Galway Kinnell
Whatever happens. Whatever
what is is is what
I want. Only that. But that.
I came across this poem as an interesting example of English grammar ...
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What is the meaning of "So away to the shool bus I flew"?
What is the meaning of "So away to the shool bus I flew" in the following sentence(Source: The Night Before The 100th DAY OF SCHOOL By Natasha Wing )
The very next morning the big day was here.
...
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Meaning of “we’ll cut him down as for the border he rides”
Welsh History 101B:
My neighbour from England has come across raiding,
Slain six of my kinsmen and burned down my hall.
It cannot be borne, this offence and injustice:
I’ve only killed ...
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About English poetry
During my studying English, I thought about how we learn our native language.
Mine is Russian. At school we learn a lot of poetry, different poems we learn by heart.
So my question is, how often ...
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What is the grammar of "my heart burdened be"?
I have some trouble understanding a line from the song, "You Raise Me Up"
When I am down and, oh my soul, so weary
When troubles come and my heart burdened be
Then, I am still and wait here in ...
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We'd as well be 10 minutes back in time?
In Storm by Tim Minchin, after a heavy argument, Tim says;
We'd as well be 10 minutes back in time,
For all the chance you'll change your mind.
Can you please explain that sentence to me from the ...
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What is the meaning of even if contact is lost here?
It means the memories last, even if contact is lost.
What is the meaning of even if contact is lost here?
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Meaning of "may do and doat" in a poem by Elizabeth Browning
"The First Time" by Elizabeth Browning:
The first time that the sun rose on thine oath
To love me, I looked forward to the moon
To slacken all those bonds which seemed too soon
And quickly ...
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Meaning of "But what time through the heart and through the brain God hath transfixed us" in a poem by Elizabeth Browning
"Discontent" by Elizabeth Barrett Browning:
Light human nature is too lightly tost
And ruffled without cause, complaining on—
Restless with rest, until, being overthrown,
It learneth to lie ...
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Meaning of "play up" in Henry Newbolt's poem "Vitai Lampada"
From Vitai Lampada:
There's a breathless hush in the Close to-night—
Ten to make and the match to win—
A bumping pitch and a blinding light,
An hour to play and the last man in.
And it's ...
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What's the meaning of "drapish"?
What's the meaning of "drapish"?
I saw this word in the poem "The Buddha" by Jack Kerouac.
However,I can't find the meaning on the internet.
I used to sit under trees and meditate
on the diamond ...
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What’s the grammatical gender of the noun ”the past” in English?
I’m translating Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s poem “The Past” (into Russian). The text is a bit confusing because of this quatrain:
I will betake me to the Past,
And she shall make my love at ...
Ksenia