Question

In Robert Frost's poem "Birches," the lines "You may see their trunks arching in the woods/ Years afterwards, trailing their leaves on the ground/ Like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair..." use which two poetic devices?

A. simile and metaphor
B. metaphor and imagery
C. imagery and alliteration
D. simile and imagery

Answer 1

D. Simple and Imagery, because he details the tree to show you what it looks like, compared to the girls on their hands and knees using the word like.

Answer 2

The correct answer is D. simile and imagery.
Simile is a figure of speech where you compare two or more things using words such as like or as. Since you can see that in this example ('like girls on hands and knees that throw their hair...') you can safely assume that B and C are incorrect. The entire picture that these lines create is quite vivid (can be clearly imagined) which is a characteristic of imagery, which is why D is the correct answer here.