Literature: Poetry (First Flight textbook selections)
What poetry questions want
Poetry questions ask what a device does, not merely what it is called. Learn each poem’s central contrast, its dominant device, and one line you can quote exactly.
Devices that recur
- Metaphor - comparison without like or as. Fog is a sustained metaphor: the fog “comes on little cat feet” and “sits looking over harbour and city”.
- Simile - comparison with like/as, as in The Tale of Custard the Dragon.
- Personification - the tree in The Trees “works all night” to free itself.
- Alliteration - “He stalks in his vivid stripes / A few steps of his cage”.
- Irony - Custard, the “cowardly” dragon, is the one who fights the pirate.
- Symbolism - the caged tiger stands for any creature kept from its natural life.
Worked example
Question: What effect does the poet create in “He stalks in his vivid stripes / A few steps of his cage”? Model: The contrast between “stalks”, a word of power and movement, and “a few steps of his cage” exposes the gap between the tiger’s nature and his confinement. The alliteration of the s sounds slows the movement, so the reader feels the constraint rather than being told about it. Reasoning: name the device, quote the exact words, then state the feeling produced.
Traps
Listing devices without explaining effect; confusing metaphor with simile; ignoring cue words such as “contrast”, “irony” or “why”; paraphrasing lines instead of interpreting them; misquoting - a half-remembered quotation costs more than none. In A Tiger in the Zoo, note that the poem moves from cage to wild and back, ending on the cage.