Question

Answer the following questions for the poem...

GRASS- CARL SANDBURG
Pile the bodies high at Austerlitz and Waterloo,
Shovel them under and let me work-
I am the grass: I cover all
And pile them high at Gettysburg.
And pile them high at Ypres and Verdun.
Shovel them under and let me work.
Two years, ten years, and the passengers ask the conductor:
What place is this?
Where are we now?
I am grass.
Let me work.
Question 1.
Where is the crucial moment where the action shifts?
2. What do you make of this change?
3. Where do you see examples of personification (state of personification and explain what is being personified)
4. What is the TONE of the poem? (I hear 2 distinct tones)
5. What are the possible THEMES of the poem? (A couple work here...)
6. What is the author saying about these themes?

Answer 1

In Carl Sandburg's poem 'Grass', the action shifts when the poem moves from recalling battlefields to the present day. Personification is used by giving the grass a voice, indicating the poem's themes of nature's power to conceal the past and the futility of war. The tone is both stark and reflective, while the themes suggest nature's indifference and the cyclical nature of life and death.

Step-by-step explanation:

The poem 'Grass' by Carl Sandburg is steeped in themes of memory, death, nature's indifference, and the transient nature of human conflicts. There is a crucial shift in the poem when the focus moves from the historical battles to modern day, where passengers on a train unknowingly traverse fields that were once battlefield domains. These battlefields have been covered by grass, signifying the passage of time and nature's reclaiming of the land.

The poem uses personification as it gives the grass a voice and a sense of purpose; it is the grass that 'covers all' and 'works' to erase the scars of war. As for the tone, Sandburg starts with a stark, blunt tone as he lists famous battlefields, but shifts to a more reflective and almost peaceful tone as he describes the grass doing its work over time.

Possible themes include the cyclical nature of life and death, the futility and anonymity of war, and the enduring power of nature to heal and conceal the traces of human strife. The author seems to be saying that despite the horrors and significance of historical events, nature eventually erases these marks, and life continues as if they had never happened. The grass is an emblem of not just nature's resilience but also of its incapacity to remember or honor the past in the way humans do.