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Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow: Perhaps the Earth can teach us as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive. Now I’ll count upto twelve - English Core

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प्रश्न

Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:

Perhaps the Earth can teach us

as when everything seems dead

and later proves to be alive.

Now I’ll count upto twelve

and you keep quiet and I will go.

(i) What does the Earth teach us? (1)

(ii) What does the poet mean to achieve by counting upto twelve? (1)

(iii) What is the significance of ‘keeping quiet’? (1)

उत्तर

(i) The Earth teaches us that there can be life under apparent stillness.

(ii) By counting upto twelve, the poet means to achieve peace and tranquility through introspection and self-analysis.

(iii) 'Keeping quiet' signifies the importance of silence, self-examination and introspection.

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Unseen Poem Comprehension
  या प्रश्नात किंवा उत्तरात काही त्रुटी आहे का?
2012-2013 (March) All India Set 1

संबंधित प्रश्‍न

A1. Saving Motherland
I can save my motherland by putting an end to ……..

Republic Day! We grow aware
That nothing can be wrought by prayer
-Prop of the credulous-until
It is supported everywhere
By an all-powerful people's will !
We have been witness in the past to sights impossible to bear:
Famine and drought and dread and doom
Continue still to spread the gloom
Of humans turned to skeletons, to shrivelled bags of naked bones
Who have not even strength to vent their suffering through sobs and groans……
MAY EVERY Indian's heart become
An unafraid announcing drum
Echoing and re-echoing a new hope and a new desire
To burn up rubbish-heaps of hate,
Once and for all. Time cannot wait!
Burn up all selfish aims and ends in a great nation's cleansing fire!
Let India's millions chant in chorus:
A mighty future stands before us-
Down with all ruthless tyranny, down with all exploitation which
Renders the poor the poorer-and renders the bloated rich, more rich !

A 2. How does the poet express the condition of people during famines and droughts?                                                                                                       (2)

Match:
Match the line with the figure of speech:

'A' ‘B’
(i) Drought and dread and doom (a) Personification
(ii) Time cannot wait (b) Alliteration
  (c) Metaphor

 


Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow :

'Never shall a young man,

Thrown into despair

By those great honey-coloured

Ramparts at your ear."

(a) Who is the speaker of these lines? Who is he speaking to ?

(b) What does the young man mean by 'honey-coloured ramparts' ?

(c) What does the word 'despair' mean ?


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below
What makes a nation's pillars high
And its foundations strong?
What makes it mighty to defy
The foes that round it throng?
It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand
Go down in battle shock;
Its shafts are laid on sinking sand,
Not on abiding rock.

(1) Why are the wealthy kingdoms unstable'? (1)

(2) Do you feel wars are the only solution to the problems between nations'? Explain. (1)

(3) Give the rhyming scheme used in the extract.  (1)

(4) Pick out the words/expressions related to the mighty kingdom.  (1)


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below :
We used to watch the valley play hide and seek .
Shadowed by the mountain's immeasurable peak
Considered the largest thing known to man
Now skyscrapers are the most extravagant and titanic part of the plan
We used to sit next to the stream, the wind caressing our crown
Watching the magnificent untamed beasts roam far, far from town
Now they are just characters of folk tales, memories we pass down
An adjective to describe someone, no more a noun
This could be our reality.

(1) What was the largest thing known to man? (1)

(2) What would be the possible result of ignoring nature? (1)

(3) Give an example of personification from the extract. (1)

( 4) Pick out from the extract some expressions of geographical images. (1)


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:
How do you know
Peace is a woman?
I know, for
I met her yesterday
on my winding way
to the world's fare.
She had such a wonderful face.
just like a golden flower faded
before her prime.

(1) How does the poet describe the face of peace?

(2) Do you feel mother can be a symbol of peace? Explain it in your own words.

(3) Name and explain the figure of speech in the following
line: 'Peace is a woman.'

(4) How does the Poet come to know that peace is a woman?


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:

If you crave not for praise when you win   
And look not for sympathy while you lose 
If cheers let not your head toss or spin
And after a set-back you ofter no excuse.
You may be the person I am looking for.

If you accept counsel without getting sore
And re-assess yourself in the light thereof
If you pledge. not to be obstinate any more
And meet others without any frown or scoff.
You may be the person I am looking for.

(1) How should you behave when you are a winner and a loser?

(2) Do you agree with the poet's view about an ideal person? Justify your answer.

(3) Pick out an example of Antithesis from the extract.

(4) Pick out the words from the extract showing our stubbornness and expression of displeasure.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: 
The banyan tree was three times as tall as our house
Its trunk had a circumference of fifty feet
Its scraggly aerial roots fell to the ground
From thirty feet or more so first they cut the branches
Sawing them off for seven days and the heap was huge
Insects and birds began to leave the tree
And then they came to its massive trunk 
Fifty men with axes chopped and chopped
The great tree revealed its rings of two hundred years
We watched in terror and fascination this slaughter

(1) How does the poet describe the banyan tree?

(2) According to you, how are trees important to maintain ecological balance?

(3) Pick out an example of repetition from the extract.

(4) Pick out the words in the extract which are related to the killing.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:

If you do not get lowered in your own eyes.
While you raise yourself in those of others
If you do not give in to gossips and lies
Rather heed them not, saying, 'Who bothers?"
You may be the person I am looking for.
If you crave not for praise when you win
And look not for sympathy while you lose
If cheers let not your head toss or spin
And after a setback you offer no excuse.
You may be the person I am looking for.
1. How does the poet expect us to react to winning and losing?
2. What efforts would you take to be a good citizens?
3. Name and explain the figure of speech in the following line.
"If you do not get lowered in your own eyes while you raise yourself in those of others"
4. Pick out the lines that express the expected reaction to rumours.

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: 
What makes a nation's pillars high
And its foundations strong?
What makes it mighty to defy
The foes that round it throng?
It is not gold. Its kingdoms grand
Go down in the battle shock;
Its shafts are laid on sinking sand,
Not on abiding rock.
Is it the sword? Ask the red dust
Of empires passed away.
(1) Why, according to the poet, are wealthy kingdoms unstable?
(2) What aspects of life in India are you proud of?
(3) Note down the pairs of rhyming words from the extract.
(4) What purpose does the use of questions serve in the extract?

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: (4) 

All dawns pass
leaving them in the dark.
They do not fear death,
they died long ago.
Old women once
were continents.
They had deep woods in them,
lakes, mountains, volcanoes even,
even raging gulfs.
When the earth was in heat
they melted, shrank,
leaving only their maps.
You can fold them
and keep them handy :
who knows, they might help you find
your way home. 
Questions: 
1. What do ‘maps’ symbolize? (1)  
2. Do you feel that you should look after your grandparents? Why? (1) 
3. Name and explain the figure of speech in the following line.
“All dawns pass leaving them in the dark” (1) 
4. What examples of geographical imagery are mentioned in the poem? (1) 
 

Read the following extract and answer the questions given  below:

While I lay awake in bed,
God's still small voice came to me and said,
"While dealing with a stranger, common courtesy you use,
But the children you love, you seem to abuse.
Look on the kitchen floor,
You'll find some flowers there by the door.
Those are the flowers she brought for you.
She picked them herself, pink, yellow and blue.
She stood quietly not to spoil the surprise,
And you never saw the tears in her eyes."

(1) What did the mother think as she lay sleepless in the bed?
(2) According to you, why shouldn't we hurt the feelings
of others?
(3) Pick out any two pairs of rhyming words from this
extract.
(4) What kind of poem is this? What is its purpose?


Read the following poem and write an appreciation of it with the help of the given points in a paragraph format:

The Pulley

When God at first made Man,
Having a glass of blessings standing by;
Let us (said He) "pour on him all we can":
Let the world's riches, which dispersed lie,
Contract into a span.

So strength first made a way;
Then beauty flow'd, then wisdom, honour, pleasure:
When almost all was out, God made a stay,
Perceiving that alone of all His treasures
Rest in the bottom lay.

For if I should (said He)
Bestow this jewel also on my creature,
He would adore my gifts instead of me,
And rest in Nature, not the God of Nature.
So both should losers be.

Yet let him keep the rest,
But keep them with repining restlessness:
Let him be rich and weary, that at last,
If goodness lead him not, yet weariness
May toss him to my breast.

  • The title of the poem       (1)
  • The poet                          (1)
  • Central idea/theme          (2)
  • Rhyme scheme                (1)
  • Figure of speech              (1)
  • Special features               (2)
  • Favourite line/lines         (1)
  • Why I like/don’t like the poem    (1)

Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:

I celebrate the virtues and vices

of suburban middle-class people 

who overwhelm the refrigerator 

and position colourful umbrellas 

near the garden that longs for a pool:

for my middle-class brother

this principle of supreme luxury:

what are you and what am I, and we go on deciding

the real truth in this world. 

(1) Give a list of the objects of luxury as given in the extract.

(2) What is your idea about a Luxurious life?

(3) Give an example of a 'paradox' from the extract.

(4) This poem does not follow any fix-verse pattern (rhyme scheme). What type of poem is it? 


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:

Now there is only one type of bobcat we see
The one that is for free, clearing the pavements of all debris
We used to walk through a footpath in a forest of pine
The smell intoxicating our lungs and mind
Now the only smell to be found comes from plastic trees
Swaying on my rear-view mirror, labelled pine breeze
We used to watch the valley play hide and seek

Questions:

(1) What signs of urbanisation are mentioned in the first six lines of the extract?

(2) Do you think skyscrapers are necessary? Why do you think so?

(3) Pick out the example of personification from the extract.

(4) Pick out the lines from the extract expressing the fond memory of the poet about the pines.


Read the extract and do all the activities that follow: 

We used to think seven generations ahead
Now we have become selfish
Only thinking about me, myself and I
Only thinking in the present, not learning from the past.
We used to stroll barefoot through the overgrown grass,
Its morning dew tickling our feet
Now we step outside onto the rugged concrete
No more natural than the over-processed food we eat
We used to walk down the snow sprinkled trail,
Maybe catch a glimpse of a bobcat, playing eye tricks with its tail
Now there is only one type of bobcat we see
The one that is fur-free, clearing the pavement of all debris
We used to walk through a footpath in a forest of pine
The smell intoxicating our lungs and mind
Now the only smell to be found comes from plastic trees.
Swaying on my rearview mirror, labelled pine breeze
we used to watch the valley play hide and seek

A1. Web :
Complete the web with the things man used to do in the past:

A2. Poetic Devices :

'We used to walk down the snow sprinkled trail'
Name the figure of speech in the above line and find out another example of the same from the extract.

A3. Personal Response :
Write in brief your views about past and present lifestyle.

A4. Poetic Creativity :
'Now we step outside onto the rugged concrete No more natural than the over-processed food.'
Read the above lines and compose at least two lines of your own. based on the same theme.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given  below:

While I lay awake in bed,
God's still small voice came to me and said,
"While dealing with a stranger, common courtesy you use,
But the children you love, you seem to abuse.
Look on the kitchen floor,
You'll find some flowers there by the door.
Those are the flowers she brought for you.
She picked them herself, pink, yellow and blue.
She stood quietly not to spoil the surprise,
And you never saw the tears in her eyes."

(1) How did the mother deal with a stranger? 
(2) What do you learn from this extract? 
(3) Give the rhyming pairs of words from the extract. (Any two)
(4) Pick out the line from the extract suggesting the mother's
insensitive behavior towards her daughter.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below: 
The banyan tree was three times as tall as our house
Its trunk had a circumference of fifty feet
Its scraggly aerial roots fell to the ground
From thirty feet or more so first they cut the branches
Sawing them off for seven days and the heap was huge
Insects and birds began to leave the tree
And then they came to its massive trunk 
Fifty men with axes chopped and chopped
The great tree revealed its rings of two hundred years
We watched in terror and fascination this slaughter
As a raw mythology revealed to us its age

(1) What were the feelings of the family members at the felling of the banyan tree?
(2) Why, according to you, did insects and birds begin to leave the banyan tree? 
(3) Find out an example of 'Repetition' from the extract.
(4) Pick out the line from the extract expressing the feelings of the people who watched the merciless cutting of the banyan
tree.


Read the following extract and answer the questions given below:
Old women once
were continents.
They had deep woods in them,
lakes, mountains, volcanoes even,
even raging gulfs.
When the earth was in heat
they melted, shrank,
leaving only their maps.
You can fold them
and keep them handy:
who knows, they might help you find
your way home.

Question
(1) For what purpose did the old women leave their 'maps' behind them?

(2) How can old people be helpful to us?

(3) Name and explain the figure of speech in the following lines:
Old women once
were continents.

(4) Make a list of geographical expressions from the extract.


Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:
I stand and look at them long and long.

They do not sweat and whine about their condition.

(a) The poet who has written these lines is ____________
i. Robert Frost
ii. Carolyn Wells
iii. Walt Whitman
iv. Ogden Nash

(b) Who are ‘they’ referred to here?
i. Animals
ii. Tigers
iii. Ananda’s friend's
iv. Wanda’s dresses

(c) The poet looks at them long and long because he __________

(d) Which word in the extract means ‘complain’?


Read the extracts given below and answer the questions that follow:

(There is a languid, emerald sea,
where the sole inhabitant is me-
a mermaid drifting blissfully.)

Questions :

(a) Who does 'me' stand for?

(b) How does 'me' feel?

(c) Who is 'me' compared to?

(d) Which word in the extract means the opposite of 'sorrowfully'?


Read the extract given below and answer the questions that follow:

"But I can get a hair-dye
And set such colour there,
Brown, or black, or carrot,
That young man in despair
May love me for myself alone
And not my yellow hair."

(a) Who is speaking these line?

(b) Why are young men in despair?

(c) What is the antonym of the word, 'despair'?


Read the following extract and do the given activities:

A1. Match the describing words from the Cloud ‘A’ with Cloud ‘B’: (02)

  Cloud ‘A’   Cloud ‘B’
1. broad a. noise
2. humorous b. jest
3. chuckling c. way
4. trifling d. grin

 

“There to the printer,” I exclaimed,
And, in my humorous way,
I added (as a trifling jest,)
“There’ll be the devil to pay.
He took the paper, and I watched,
And saw him peep within
At the first line, he read, his face
Was all upon the grin
He read the next; the grin grew broad.
And shot from ear to ear;
He read the third; a chuckling noise
I now began to hear.
The fourth; he broke into a roar;
The fifth; his waistband split;
The sixth; he burst five buttons off
And tumbled in a fit.

A2. Pick out two lines from the extract that indicate humour. (02)

A3. Write two pairs of rhyming words from the extract. (01)


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