A preview of Monday’s seminar and questions you might want to think about.

For those who didn’t bring the poems home, this is the poem:

I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.

In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.

You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and pray you’ll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.

Questions:

1. Is there any significance of the rhyme scheme or the syllable count?
2. Are there any literary devices? (Refer to the sheet of paper)
3. Is there any symbolism?
4. Who does the “you” in the 9th line refer to?
5. What does the writer want to express?

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