8th Grade Poetry Assignment
Goal: To get a vital sense of the poetry world – what poetry is, what wonderful variety is available, who writes poems, what makes poetry special as a form of literature, and why people love and need poetry in their lives.
This assignment requires you to:
1. choose a minimum of TEN (10) lines from Ten (10) different poems written by ten different poets and put them in an order that makes one coherent poem, tied together by a unifying theme. You can include your poem selection for the McLane Poetry recitation.
2. You will give it an original title.
3. You will credit each poet and give the title of each.
4. You must use each of the following poetic devices in your poems:
- Alliteration
- Personification
- Metaphor
- Assonance
- Imagery
- Symbol
- Onomatopoeia
- Simile
5. You will write a short paper about your poem where you list the examples of each literary devices. Here is where you might include observations about the rhyme scheme, rhythm, and tone, and you explain the theme of your poem.
6. Then you must illustrate your poem and put it on a poster.
A Feast, by Mrs. Sullivan
A poet, I guess, is more or less
Preoccupied with gender.
Yet I, though custom call me crude,
Prefer to sing in praise of food.
Homemade pies, chocolate mints and puddings,
Coffee and graceful glasses of water, chipped ice
Clinking the rims.
Pain perdu: lost bread. Thick slices sunk in milk,
fringed with crisp lace of browned egg and scattered sugar.
(“French Toast,” Anya Krugovoy Silver) alliteration
hoodoo soup with chicken necks,
a gumbo with plutonium roux, a little snack
before the dirt-and-jalapeño stew
(“Mambo Cadillac,” Barbara Hamby) assonance
abandoned pie...seeping red
Like a thing not yet altogether dead.
(“Pie,” X.J. Kennedy) simile
apples, coming off the peeler,
Are winding staircases, little accordions,
slinky toys, jack-in-the-box fruit,
(“Apple Season,” Joyce Sutphen) metaphor
delicious
so sweet
and so cold
(“This is Just to Say,” William Carlos Williams) imagery
I think of summer with its luminous fruit,
blossoms rounding to berries, leaves,
handsful of grain.
(“Cold Poem,” Mary Oliver) symbol
Rubric 1
Your Poem
As you submit your poetry project, please grade yourself before I do. Be sure to provide specifics to explain why you have earned the grade you give yourself.
_____ Original title ____________________________________
_____ Ten lines from ten different poems written by ten different poets
_____ You have credited each poet and given the title of each poem.
_____ Each of the following poetic devices is in your poem (10 pts/device)
___ Alliteration
___ Personification
___ Metaphor
___ Assonance
___ Imagery
___ Symbol
___ Onomatopoeia
___ Simile
_____ The poem is coherent, tied together by a unifying theme.
_____ TOTAL
Rubric 2
Poster
Your poster...
_____ reflects theme of your poem
_____ is colorful
_____ is neat
_____ has the entire page filled with design/words
_____ includes your poem that is easy to read
_____ TOTAL