Poetry+1

=**//Literature of Sport//**= =**Mr. Greenhill**=

=** A.E. Housman (1859-1936),** TO AN ATHLETE DYING YOUNG (1896)=

The time you won your town the race We chaired you through the market-place; Man and boy stood cheering by, And home we brought you shoulder-high.

To-day, the road all runners come, Shoulder-high we bring you home, And set you at your threshold down, Townsman of a stiller town.

Smart lad, to slip betimes away From fields where glory does not stay And early though the laurel grows It withers quicker than the rose.

Eyes the shady night has shut Cannot see the record cut, And silence sounds no worse than cheers After earth has stopped the ears:

Now you will not swell the rout Of lads that wore their honours out, Runners whom renown outran And the name died before the man.

So set, before its echoes fade, The fleet foot on the sill of shade, And hold to the low lintel up The still-defended challenge-cup.

And round that early-laurelled head Will flock to gaze the strengthless dead, And find unwithered on its curls The garland briefer than a girl's.


 * CONNECTIONS: Go to the wiki page "More Pre links"; Steve Prefontaine embodies the poem. Also go to these Roberto Clemente links here, starting with the same video excerpt we watch in class from the famous Ken Burns documentary //Baseball//: [|Clemente][|Clemente tribute]**
 * Lastly, read this incredible article about someone just like Prefontaine, who died young. This one is an even better fit for the poem because the athlete died in war. The subject is the legendary Hobey Baker, after whom the college ice hockey equivalent of the Heisman Trophy is named. He was also a huge football star. [|"A Flame that Burned Too Brightly"]**

=__**Sports Poetry: Imagery**__= = = =**Walt Whitman (1819-1892)**= =THE RUNNER (1867)=

On a flat road runs the well-train’d runner; He is lean and sinewy, with muscular legs; He is thinly clothed—he leans forward as he runs, With lightly closed fists, and arms partially rais’d.

__Writing with Images*__ Think of Whitman’s poem above as an example to start from rather tan as a model to copy mechanically.


 * From Kennedy, X.J. //Literature//. New York: Harper Collins, 1991.

[|Walt Whitman biography and photos]

The study guide below is for Whitman's poem above and two other poems distributed in hard copy form. We'll try to put those two poems in here, too.

=__**POEMS THAT STRESS OTHER TECHNIQUES:**__= = = = ** Grantland Rice (1880-1954) ** = = ALUMNUS FOOTBALL (1923) =

Bill Jones had been the shining star upon his college team. His tackling was ferocious and his bucking was a dream. When husky William took the ball beneath his brawny arm They had two extra men to ring the ambulance alarm.

Bill hit the line and ran the ends like some mad bull amuck. The other team would shiver when they saw him start to buck. And when some rival tackler tried to block his dashing pace, On waking up, he'd ask, "Who drove that truck across my face?"

Bill had the speed-Bill had the weight-Bill never bucked in vain; From goal to goal he whizzed along while fragments, strewed the plain, And there had been a standing bet, which no one tried to call, That he could make his distance through a ten-foot granite wall.

When he wound up his college course each student's heart was sore. They wept to think bull-throated Bill would sock the line no more. Not so with William - in his dreams he saw the Field of Fame, Where he would buck to glory in the swirl of Life's big game.

Sweet are the dreams of college life, before our faith is nicked- The world is but a cherry tree that's waiting to be picked; The world is but an open road-until we find, one day, How far away the goal posts are that called us to the play.

So, with the sheepskin tucked beneath his arm in football style, Bill put on steam and dashed into the thickest of the pile; With eyes ablaze he sprinted where the laureled highway led- When Bill woke up his scalp hung loose and knots adorned his head.

He tried to run the ends of life, but with rib-crushing toss A rent collector tackled him and threw him for a loss. And when he switched his course again and dashed into the line The massive Guard named Failure did a toddle on his spine.

Bill tried to punt out of the rut, but ere he turned the trick Right Tackle Competition scuttled through and blocked the kick. And when he tackled at Success in one long, vicious prod The Fullback Disappointment steered his features in sod.

Bill was no quitter, so he tried a buck in higher gear, But Left Guard Envy broke it up and stood him on his ear. Whereat he aimed a forward pass, but in two vicious bounds Big Center Greed slipped through a hole and rammed him out of bounds.

But one day, when across the Field of Fame the goal seemed dim, The wise old coach, Experience, came up and spoke to him. "Oh Boy," he said, "the main point now before you win your bout Is keep on bucking Failure till you've worn the piker out!"

"And, kid, cut out this fancy stuff - go in there, low and hard; Just keep your eye upon the ball and plug on, yard by yard,  And more than all, when you are thrown or tumbled with a crack,  Don't sit there whining-hustle up and keep on coming back;

"Keep coming back with all you've got, without an alibi, If Competition trips you up or lands upon your eye,  Until at last above the din you hear this sentence spilled:  'We might as well let this bird through before we all get killed.'

"You'll find the road is long and rough, with soft spots far apart, Where only those can make the grade who have the Uphill Heart.  And when they stop you with a thud or halt you with a crack,  Let Courage call the signals as you keep on coming back.

"Keep coming back, and though the world may romp across your spine, Let every game's end find you still upon the battling line;  For when the One Great Scorer comes to mark against your name,  He writes - not that you won or lost - but how you played the Game."

[|Grantland Rice biography and photos]

= Looking at Two Poems: “The Runner,” by Walt Whitman and “Alumnus Football,” = = by Grantland Rice =

= “The Runner,” by Walt Whitman =

__ 1. Imagery consists of words that appeal to the senses. This poem appeals most to the __ __ senses of sight and touch. What things do you see and feel in this poem? Where __ __ in your own body do you feel the latter? __

__ 2. The language of good poetry is concrete, __**//not//** abstract. Imagery is concrete language. What are the terms, that refer to our senses, for the different types of imagery?

= “Alumnus Football,” by Grantland Rice =

1. Why is the poem entitled “alumnus” football?

2. What is a “sheepskin” in stanza 6?

3. What type of figure of speech occurs frequently in this poem? The poem as a whole is an extended example of what other figure of speech?

4. What meter is the poem written in?

5. How do we usually express, in informal speech, the famous concept expressed in the last two lines of the poem? Do you agree with this idea?

**Note:** As in “To an Athlete Dying Young,” this poem refers to the //laurel// (stanza 6). //brawny// (stanza 1): muscular //toddle// (stanza 7): to walk with short, uncertain steps //piker// (stanza 10): (slang) person who does things in a petty, stingy way

= Types of Poetry =

Most poetry in English falls into four categories**: lyric poetry, narrative poetry, didactic poetry, and dramatic poetry.** They are defined as follows: Lyric – a short poem expressing the thoughts and feelings of a single speaker Narrative – a poem whose main concern is to tell a story Didactic – a poem written to teach or to state a message Dramatic – a poem written as a speech made at some decisive or revealing moment (usually addressed by the speaker to some other character who remains silent). Also known as dramatic monologue.

= Which type is each of the three poems above? =

=__**Poetry Writing Opportunity 2014**__=


 * Poetry Writing Opportunity**

You have a chance to try your hand at writing poems similar to the ones you’ve read. J

You’ll write two poems as follows:

just as Walt Whitman’s “The Runner” does. Any sports subject is fine. Make your words concrete and vivid. :) Make it all one complete, sentence as Whitman did.
 * 1.** Write a poem 4-6 lines long (on a sports subject) that consists mainly of imagery,


 * 2.** Write a poem 8-12 lines long, which means two or three four-line stanzas (//about your favorite professional sports team//) that either uses **iambic heptameter**, as “Alumnus Football” does; or use the same meter we saw in “To an Athlete Dying Young,” which means creating four-line stanzas in which you use either **iambic tetrameter** in every line or **8 syllables of trochaic meter** **(trochaic tetrameter)** in every line.
 * __Also use some type of regular rhyme scheme. Have fun with it. :)__**

**__ BELOW ARE VERY HELPFUL TIPS ON HOW TO USE METER AND RHYME. TAKE ADVANTAGE OF THEM! :) __**

 * __Try to come close also to imitating the punctuation in the original poems.__**


 * __PLEASE NOTE THAT NONE OF THE POEMS WE HAVE READ HAVE SENTENCE FRAGMENTS IN THEM!!!__ ALL THE THOUGHTS ARE COMPLETE THOUGHTS.** **//__Oddly, when given the chance to write poems, students often create poems that use only (or mostly) sentence fragments, i.e. incomplete thoughts, even though they have almost never seen poems that do this when they read poems for a course. This baffles me. And it creates very bad poetry. Please do not do this__.//** **// :) //**


 * IF YOU HAVE QUESTIONS ABOUT ANY OF THIS OR NEED HELP, PLEASE LET MR. GREENHILL KNOW.** ** :) **


 * Due Dates for both poems: brainstorming, Wed., 11/12**
 * 2 rough drafts, Friday, 11/14**
 * Final drafts (with all rough material), Mon.-Wed., 11/24-11/26**
 * On your chosen final due date, __you'll submit brainstorming, at least two rough drafts per__ __poem, and the final drafts. LOVE YOUR FINISHED PRODUCT__! :)**


 * (There will be no other preliminary deadlines. BE SMART AND WORK ON IT A LITTLE EACH NIGHT.****) :)**

__** Tips on Using Meter and Rhyme **__** :) **


 * Iambic meter**—starts with an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed syllable and then repeats the pattern)


 * Trochaic meter**—starts with a stressed syllable followed by an unstressed syllable and then repeats the pattern)


 * __Tips on Meter__**

To help you create **iambic meter**, you might benefit from using the following approaches: Start lines with a preposition, article, pronoun, conjunction, or a transitional word; or try a one-syllable adjective. Put a verb after its subject, or put a noun before the adjective that modifies it. Replace a vowel (and thus a syllable) with an apostrophe (use this sparingly). Put an accent mark over the –ed ending of a verb (to add a syllable) (use this sparingly).

For **trochaic meter**, take the opposite approach or approaches not mentioned above for iambic. In other words, avoid starting lines with a preposition, article, pronoun, conjunction, or a transitional word. One-syllable words are often stressed and thus could be helpful to you. But there are many words of more than one syllable that begin with a stressed syllable.

For both types of meter, it can be helpful not to feel obligated to end lines with a period or other type of full stop, or with a completed thought. (However, for this assignment, try to come somewhat close to the punctuation used in the poem that is serving as your model.)


 * __Tips on Rhyme__**

Use slant rhyme if you need to. (Look up slant rhyme if you don’t remember what it is.)

Consider rhyme one word with two, if that fits.


 * Consult __rhymezone.com__! (Or similar sites.)**

Manipulate punctuation. Consider even using periods in places other than the end of lines.


 * __Tips on other things__**

To start your poem, you might just choose a thought or subject, and then say something you’d naturally say about it.

Keep your language concrete as much as possible.

Remember that figures of speech are available to help you!


 * __Remember__: The challenges of using meter and rhyme make you “think of better things than you would all by yourself.”** ** J **

=**GAME CALLED 1910 **= = Grantland Rice =

 Game Called. Across the field of play  the dusk has come, the hour is late.  The fight is done and lost or won,  the player files out through the gate.  The tumult dies, the cheer is hushed,  the stands are bare, the park is still.  But through the night there shines the light,  home beyond the silent hill.

 Game Called.  Where in the golden light  the bugle rolled the reveille.  The shadows creep where night falls deep,  and taps has called the end of play. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> The game is done, the score is in, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> the final cheer and jeer have passed. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> But in the night, beyond the fight, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> the player finds his rest at last.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Game Called. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Upon the field of life <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> the darkness gathers far and wide, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> the dream is done, the score is spun <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> that stands forever in the guide. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> Nor victory, nor yet defeat <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> is chalked against the players name. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> But down the roll, the final scroll, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;"> shows only how he played the game.

= Questions: =

1. What visual images can you find in this poem?

2. What auditory images can you find in this poem?

3. What words in the poem imply death?

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">By __ [|John Updike] __
 * <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 32px;">Ex-Basketball Player **

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Pearl Avenue runs past the high-school lot, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Bends with the trolley tracks, and stops, cut off <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Before it has a chance to go two blocks, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">At Colonel McComsky Plaza. Berth’s Garage <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Is on the corner facing west, and there, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Most days, you'll find Flick Webb, who helps Berth out.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Flick stands tall among the idiot pumps— <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Five on a side, the old bubble-head style, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Their rubber elbows hanging loose and low. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">One’s nostrils are two S’s, and his eyes <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">An E and O. And one is squat, without <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">A head at all—more of a football type.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Once Flick played for the high-school team, the Wizards. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">He was good: in fact, the best. In ’46 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">He bucketed three hundred ninety points, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">A county record still. The ball loved Flick. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">I saw him rack up thirty-eight or forty <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">In one home game. His hands were like wild birds.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">He never learned a trade, he just sells gas, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Checks oil, and changes flats. Once in a while, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">As a gag, he dribbles an inner tube, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">But most of us remember anyway. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">His hands are fine and nervous on the lug wrench. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">It makes no difference to the lug wrench, though.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Off work, he hangs around Mae’s Luncheonette. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Grease-gray and kind of coiled, he plays pinball, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Sips lemon cokes, and smokes those thin cigars. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Flick seldom says a word to Mae, just nods <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Beyond her face toward bright applauding tiers <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif'; font-size: 16px;">Of Necco Wafers, Nibs, and Juju Beads.

Emra, Bruce. //Sports in Literature//. Chicago: NTC Publishing, 1991. Print.
=**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Garrett Hongo (b. 1951) **= = = =**<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">THE CADENCE OF SILK 1988 **=

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">When I lived in Seattle, I loved watching <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The Sonics play basketball; something <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">About that array of trained and energetic <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Bodies set in motion to attack a more <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Sluggish, less physically intelligent opponent 5 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Appealed to me, taught me about cadence <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">And play, the offguard breaking free <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Before the rebound, “releasing,” as is said <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">In the parlance of the game, getting to <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The center’s downcourt pass and streaking 10 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">To the basket for a scoopshot layup <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">off the glass, all in rhythm, all in <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">perfect declensions of action, smooth <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">and strenuous as Gorgiasian rhetoric. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">I was hooked on the undulant ballet 15 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Of the pattern offense, on the set play <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Back-door under the basket, and, at times, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Even on the auctioneer’s pace and elocution <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">of the play-by-play man. Now I watch <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">the Lakers, having returned to Los Angeles 20 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">some years ago, love them even more than <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">the Seattle team, long since broken up and aging. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The Lakers are incomparable, numerous <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Options for any situation, their players <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The league’s quickest, most intelligent, 25 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">And, it is my opinion, frankly, the most cool. <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Few bruisers, they are sleek as arctic seals, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Especially the small forward <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">As he dodges through the key, away from <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The ball, rubbing off his man on the screen, 30 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Setting for his shot. Then, slick as spit, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Comes the ball from the point guard, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">And my man goes up, cradling the ball <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">In his right hand like a waiter balancing <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">A tray piled with champagne in stemmed glasses, 35 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Cocking his arm and bringing the ball <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Back behind his ear, pumping, letting fly then <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">As he jumps, popcorn-like, in the corner, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">While the ball, launched, slung dexterously <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">With a slight backspin, slashes through 40 <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">The basket’s silk net with a small, <span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">Sonorous splash of completion.

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">14 Gorgiasian rhetoric: art of persuasive speaking as practiced by Gorgias (485?-380? B.C.), Greek Sophist philosopher, who argued that nothing exists

<span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman','serif';">(Taken from //Literature//, XJ Kennedy.)