Programme 8 - Activities

You can read the poems (below). The suggested activities, devised by qualified teachers, follow the poems.

Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.

Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.

Oh, no no no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.

1  Look at the number of lines, their length and arrangement on the page. Are they regular or irregular? How does the structure of this poem help to convey emotion?

2  Practice reading this comi-tragic poem read aloud. Work with a partner to devise a performance of the poem.

Back to top

Did the people of Vietnam
use lanterns of stone?

Did they hold ceremonies
to reverence the opening of buds?

Were they inclined to quiet laughter?

Did they use bone and ivory,
jade and silver, for ornament?

Had they an epic poem?

Did they distinguish between speech and singing?

Sir, their light hearts turned to stone.
It is not remembered whether in gardens
stone lanterns illumined pleasant ways.

Perhaps they gathered once to delight in blossom,
but after the children were killed there were no more buds.

Sir, laughter is bitter to the burned mouth.

A dream ago, perhaps. Ornament is for joy.
All the bones were charred.

It is not remembered. Remember
most were peasants; their life
was in rice and bamboo.
When peaceful clouds were reflected in the paddies
and the water buffalo stepped surely along the terraces,
maybe fathers told their sons old tales.
When bombs smashed those mirrors
there was time only to scream.

There is an echo yet
of their speech which was like a song.
It was reported their singing resembled
the flight of moths in moonlight.
Who can say? It is silent now.

1 The poem is in the form of a series of questions. The questions are mostly straightforward, but the answers are not. In a group, discuss your thoughts on the question and answer format in the poem? What impression does it create of the Vietnamese people?

2 This poem is not about individual people but about big political events. What do you think of the way the poet presents history and politics here?

Back to top

Softly, in the dusk, a woman is singing to me;
Taking me back down the vista of years, till I see
A child sitting under the piano, in the boom of the tingling strings
And pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she
sings.

In spite of myself, the insidious mastery of song
Betrays me back, till the heart of me weeps to belong
To the old Sunday evenings at home, with winter outside
And hymns in the cosy parlour, the tinkling piano our guide.

So now it is vain for the singer to burst into clamour
With the great black piano appassionato. The glamour
Of childish days is upon me, my manhood is cast
Down in the flood of remembrance, I weep like a child for the
past.

1 When was the poem written? What do we know about its historical context? What was happening at the same time in terms of history and the other arts: music, painting, architecture, fashion and other forms of literature?

2 Compare this poem with Seamus Heaney's poem, 'Follower'. Both are from the point of view of a young boy. What are the similarities and differences?

Back to top

OSCAR WILDE (1854-1900)
From The Ballad of Reading Gaol (1897)

He did not wear his scarlet coat
For blood and wine are red,
And blood and wine were on his hands
When they found him with the dead,
The poor dead woman whom he loved,
And murdered in her bed.

He walked among the Trial Men
In a suit of shabby gray;
A cricket cap was on his head,
And his step seemed light and gay;
But I never saw a man who looked
So wistfully at the day.
I never saw a man who looked
With such a wistful eye
Upon that little tent of blue
Which prisoners call the sky,
And at every drifting cloud that went
With sails of silver by.

I walked, with other souls in pain,
Within another ring,
And was wondering if the man had done
A great or little thing.
When a voice behind me whispered low,
'That fellow's got to swing.'

Dear Christ! The very prison walls
Suddenly seemed to reel,
And the sky above my head became
Like a casque of scorching steel;
And, though I was a soul in pain,
My pain I could not feel.

I only knew what hunted thought
Quickened his step, and why
He looked upon the garish day
With such a wistful eye;
The man had killed the thing he loved,
And so he had to die.

1  What form does the poem follow? Does it draw on an established tradition? For example, does it use strict verse form in terms of metre and rhyme? Is its language formal or colloquial? Does it use any unusual words?

2  How does the syntax of each sentence relate to the line-pattern of the poem? Does that affect how we read the poem?

General activity
Several of the poems have a common theme or subject or some shared feature of approach, style or structure - for example, poems spoken by a character as monologues or themes such as nature, love, family and relationships, past and present, interesting characters, growing up... Having considered all the poems in Programme 8, make notes about themes, styles and key images.

Back to top