Question

The falling leaf inaugurates the reign of her confusion; Which dictionary definition of inaugurates BEST applies to its use in the sentence.

a) to initiate
b) to begin formally
c) to induct into office
d) to introduce into public through ceremony

She fears him, and will always ask what fated her to choose him; She meets in his engaging mask all reasons to refuse him; But what she meets and what she fears are less than are the downward years, drawn slowly to the foamless weirs of age, were she to lose him. Which pair of words BEST describe the speaker's tone in this stanza?
a) fear and anger
b) boredom and apathy
c) pretentious and pompous
d) helplessness and resignation

She fears him, and will always ask what fated her to choose him; Why did the poet MOST LIKELY use the word fated instead of the word caused?
a) The poet uses this as an allusion to mythology.
b) The poet's word choice implies an unpleasant outcome.
c) The poet needed a two-syllable word to fit the rhythm.
d) The poet had no particular reason for his word choices.

What is the author trying to suggest by his use of the word 'vibrate' in line 32?
a) How the town was exactly like her home, buzzing with excitement
b) How the townspeople went rhythmically and steadily about their daily business
c) How the town pulsed with gossip about the woman's choice to hide in her seclusion
d) How the townspeople moved quickly and repeatedly in their normal fashion while she was content to let them do it

A sense of ocean and old trees envelops and allures him; Tradition, touching all he sees, beguiles and reassures him; Which word BEST describes the speaker's tone in lines 17-20?
a) bitterness
b) caution
c) confidence
d) fear

Contrast the speaker's tone in lines 1-8 with the speaker's tone in lines 17-20. Which of these BEST describes the shift?
a) The speaker's tone changes from jubilant to despondent.
b) The speaker's tone changes from confidence to resignation.
c) The speaker's tone changes from resignation to confidence.
d) The speaker's tone changes from joyfulness to resignation.

Between a blurred sagacity that once had power to sound him, and Love, that will not let him be the Judas that she found him; Which dictionary definition of sound BEST applies to its use in the lines that begin stanza 2?
a) to proclaim
b) to examine, test, or investigate
c) to make a loud noise, as in an alarm
d) to test or measure the bottom of the sea

Answer 1

The third and fourth stanzas create a sense of anticipation and the use of the word 'feather' emphasizes its significance in the poem.

Step-by-step explanation:

To begin with, the third and fourth stanzas make up one complete sentence, with a colon at the end of the third announcing the fourth; this helps achieve a sense of building up towards something important.

Then, we move from the visual image of a large spacious moor to the very circumscribed or restricted place where the feather is found, but the reason why this 'hand's-breadth' shines out is delayed for the next two lines.

'For there I picked up on the heather'-Okay, what did you pick up?—'And there I put inside my breast'-still don't know what you picked up—‘A moulted feather’—ah, I see! Notice the internal rhyme of ‘feather' with 'heather,' which draws attention to, and emphasizes the harmony of, the moment.

Also, the word ‘feather’ is repeated and expanded: ‘an eagle-feather.'

Clearly, the feather of no other bird would do, for, ultimately, the comparison is of the eagle to the poet; Browning knows Shelley through his poetry as he knows the eagle through its feather, and that feather presents a striking visual image.