Poetry Stylistic Analysis Worksheet PDF

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Robert Frost’s A Prayer in Spring Poetry Stylistic Analysis Guide Questions

1. How many stanzas are there in the poem?
2. How many lines are there in each stanza?
3. What do we call the stanza with four poetic lines?
4. What is the rhyme scheme of the poem (aabb, abab etc.)?
5. What end sounds are in rhymes in the first stanza (Use phonetic symbols e.g. /     /  and /     /,  /    /  and /    /)?
6. What type of phrase is the title of the poem (verb, noun, prepositional, complementizer phrase)?
7. Try creating a phrase structure tree for the title of the poem (Please use the other side of the paper).
8. What stylistic device has been employed by the poet through the use of the expression ‘Oh’ in the first lines of first and second stanzas?
9. What is the noun reference of the pronoun He in the fourteenth line?
10. What stylistic device is employed in the fifth line as in the phrase the orchard white?
11. Is there a regularized number of syllables or meter in each line?
12. How is the word ghosts used in the poem (by connotation or by denotation)?
13. What is the subject of the poem?
14. What mood/tone does the personal have?
15. How is the word round used in the eighth line (as noun, adjective, adverb etc.)?
16. Give other synonyms for the word sanctify.
17. What does it mean by the phrase springing of the year?
18. To what or to whom is the word swarm in eighth line best attached (trees, bees, ghosts etc.)?
19. How is the word above used in fourteenth line (literal or contextual)?
20. What stylistic device is employed in the phrase the darting bird in the ninth line?
21. Write a stylistic analysis of the poem with emphasis on the foregrounded elements and the Belles Lettres functional style employed.

A Prayer in Spring

Robert Frost

Oh, give us pleasure in the flowers to-day; ⁽¹⁾
And give us not to think so far away ⁽²⁾
As the uncertain harvest; keep us here ⁽³⁾
All simply in the springing of the year. ⁽⁴⁾

Oh, give us pleasure in the orchard white, ⁽⁵⁾
Like nothing else by day, like ghosts by night; ⁽⁶⁾
And make us happy in the happy bees, ⁽⁷⁾
The swarm dilating round the perfect trees. ⁽⁸⁾

And make us happy in the darting bird ⁽⁹⁾
That suddenly above the bees is heard, ⁽¹⁰⁾
The meteor that thrusts in with needle bill, ⁽¹¹⁾
And off a blossom in mid air stands still. ⁽¹²⁾

For this is love and nothing else is love, ⁽¹³⁾
The which it is reserved for God above ⁽¹⁴⁾
To sanctify to what far ends He will, ⁽¹⁵⁾
But which it only needs that we fulfill. ⁽¹⁶⁾