Request to a Year

Question 1

Request to a Year

Answer 1

• Request: usually towards a person
• Year: as a unit of time, perhaps hinting to an omniscient being
• A: indefinite article, perhaps shows how the request for her great great grandmother’s attitude is a recurring event every year

Question 2

Structure & Form

Answer 2

• Five quatrains and then a couplet
• No clear rhyme scheme
• No clear meter
• Free verse

Question 3

“legendary devotee”

Answer 3

• Legendary 1: shows the persona’s respect and admiration towards her great great grandmother
• Legendary 1: perhaps hinting to how the persona’s great great grandmother’s love for art is well known by people
• Devotee 1: Shows how the persona’s great great grandmother is very focused on art

Question 4

Alpenstock

Answer 4

A long wooden pole with a iron tip
*Used my shepherds and hikers/climbers
*Was used to traverse the alps

Question 5

“(which luckily later caught him on his way)”

Answer 5

*The line is in parentheses, so to indicate that this part of the story is unimportant.
*marginalized since it is not the main point/message of the poem.

Question 6

“Year, if you have no Mother’s day present planned,
Reach back and bring me the firmness of her hand.”

Answer 6

The author does not intend for the year to magically grant her anything, but she hopes she can work on her attitude and be more like her great-great grandomother.

Question 7

“Nothing, it was evident, could be done.”

Answer 7

The grandmother quickly realizes that she is unable to so anything so instead of panicking, she stays calm and brings herself to do the only thing she can: record what happened.
*the commas before and after “it was evident” augments the fact that there was actually nothing that could be done

Question 8

“Struck rock bottom eighty feet below”

Answer 8

• Rock - has the connotation of being hard and sharp, creates tension and elevates the danger presented in this situation
• Eighty feet - emphasizes that the fall is from a very high place, further elevating the danger presented in this situation
• Consonance - Creates a sharp and hard atmosphere, the plosive “k” sounds heightens the sense of danger in this quote

Question 9

Imagery

Answer 9

*sat one day on a high rock
*small ice floe, drift down the current toward a waterfall
*stretched out a last-hope alpenstock

Question 10

Themes

Answer 10

*Role of the artist-the grandmother
*Feminisim-petticoats, firmness of her hand, mothers-day

Question 11

Alternative interpretation

Answer 11

• The ice flow represents life, as the symbol of water usually represents motherhood and life (the phrase “my water broke” refers to premature rupture of membranes before labor).
• The fall from the ice flow represents the difficulties in life.
• By doing nothing, the great great grandmother is letting her children solve their problems by themselves
• By holding out an alpenstock, the sister saves her brother, which hightlights the love between siblings

Question 12

Theme – memory and the power of art

Answer 12

• The whole poem was recounting the events in the artwork
• It was also through the artwork that the persona gained the understanding of her great great grandmother’s attitude
• Conveys the power of art – her great great grandmother did not retell the events herself, but her artwork conveyed her attitude and the story through time

Question 13

Poet context

Answer 13

• Wrote a lot of nature poems

Question 14

Time period context

Answer 14

• Petticoats - restraining the movement of women of that time, signifies the society’s restriction on women
• First published in 1955
• Recounting the events in the 19th century, when women were hindered by societal expectations a lot more than the 20th century