Question

Poetic devices used in poem an elementary school classroom in a slum

Answer 1

Answer:

Figures of speech in the poem

Figure of speech                   Example

Simile                                Like rootless weeds

Metaphor                       The paper-seeming boy

Metaphor                      civilized dome riding all cities

Metaphor                       their future’s painted with a fog

Metaphor                      A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky

Metaphor                     lives that slyly turn in their cramped holes

Metaphor                    On their slag heap

Simile                           like bottle bits on stones

Simile                         these windows That shut upon their lives like catacombs

Metaphor                 History is theirs whose language is the sun

Answer 2

There are several literary devices used in the poem "An Elementary School in the Slum" including alliteration, simile, metaphor, imagery, synecdoche, and irony.

Simile is the comparison of the two things using the words 'like' or 'as.' In the first stanza, "Like rootless weeds" is the example of a smile where the students are compared to the unwanted plants. "Sour cream walls," "like bottle bits on stones,"

Metaphor is the comparison of two very different things and here only one thing lies in common. The example of a metaphor is "paper seeming boy" when the poet compares one of the boys to resemble much like a paper. "Rat's eyes," "map," "sealed with a lead sky," "cramped holes," "endless night," and "white and green leaves."

Alliteration is the repetition of the same consonant sound. "From Fog" is an example of the use of alliteration.