Introduction
Poetry Packet Day 2
*Please add this section to your first day packet*
What is free verse?
A poem which does not rhyme like usual poems, but still expresses an emotions or tells a story.
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Without Commercials by Alice Walker
Listen, stop tanning yourself and talking about fish belly white. The color white is not bad at all. There are white mornings that bring us days. Or, if you must, tan only because it makes you happy to be brown, to be able to see for a summer the whole world’s darker face reflected in your own.
Stop unfolding your eyes. Your eyes are beautiful. Sometimes seeing you in the street the fold zany and unexpected I want to kiss them and usually it is only old gorgeous black people’s eyes I want to kiss.
Stop trimming your nose. When you diminish your nose your songs become little tiny, muted and snub. Better you should have a nose impertinent as a flower, sensitive as a root,
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wise, elegant, serious and deep. A nose that Sniffs the essence of Earth. And knows the message of every leaf.
Stop bleaching your skin and talking about so much black is not beautiful. The color black is not bad at all. There are black that rock us in dreams. Or, if you must, bleach only because it pleases you to be brown, to be able to see for as long as you can bear the whole world’s lighter face reflected in your own.
As for me, I have learned to worship the sun again. To affirm the adventures of hair.
For we are all splendid descendants of wilderness, Eden: needing only to see each other without commercials to believe. Copied skillfully as Adam. Original as Eve. |
Essential Questions to “17 Without Commercials:” (Answer these questions below)
What story is this poem telling?
What examples does the author use to emphasis the meaning behind this poem?
What emotions did it invoke in you as the reader? Is it a poem you can relate to?
*Please write your answers in your Poetry Packet (Day 2) on Page 3*