Monsoon History: Exercises

Read the stanza below and answer the questions that follow.

The air is wet,
……soaks
Into mattresses,
….curls
In apparitions of smoke.
Like fat white slugs furled
Among the timber, ,
Or silver fish tunnelling
The damp linen covers
Of schoolbooks,
….or walking
Quietly like centipedes,
The air walking everywhere
On its hundred feet
Is filled with glare
Of tropical water.

1. What is the above stanza about?

2. What kind of imagery is used to depict the dampness?

3. What kind of climate is depicted in the above stanza?

Poetic Devices used in” Monsoon History”.

Simile - “The air is wet….. Like fat white slugs furled
- “The air still silent
Like sleepers rocked in the pantun”,

Metaphor - watch mother uncoil
Her snake hair

Onomatopoeia - silver fish tunnelling
- rolling darkness
- down pouring rain
- the air ticks with gnats……

Contrast - “Clashing their timid horns”

Read and understand the devices above.