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Marshlands
Emily Pauline Johnson
About Emily Pauline Johnson
Emily Pauline Johnson was a poet and performer. She was the daughter of a Mohawk chief and his English wife. Johnson's poetry often conveys American legends and beliefs with a dramatic intensity.
A thin wet sky, that yellows at the rim,
And meets with sun-lost lip the marsh's brim.
The pools low low lying, dank with moss and mould,
Glint through their mildews like large cups of gold.
Among the wild rice in the still lagoon,
In monotone the lizard shrills his tune.
The wild goose, homing, seeks a sheltering,
Where rushes grow, and oozing lichens cling.
Late cranes with heavy wing, and lazy flight,
Sail up the silence with the nearing night.
And like a spirit, swathed in some soft veil,
Steals twilight and its shadows o'er the swale.
Hushed lie the sedges, and the vapours creep,
Thick, grey and humid, while the marshes sleep.
Available Answers
- 1.
The poet refers to the edge of the sky as its 'lip'.
- Why has she described the lip as 'sun-lost'? How has it lost the sun?
- What does the 'sun-lost lip' meeting the 'brim' of the marsh look like?
- 2.
What in the marsh look like 'large cups of gold'? Can you explain why they have been described like that?
- 3.Why has the wild goose come to the marsh? Where is it going?
- 4.Which words from the poem tell us how big the crane is and how fast it is flying?
- 5.How is the fog that comes over the marshes described? Do you know what time of day it is when the fog arrives?
- 6.The poem describes what the marshlands are like during a shift in time in the day. What shift is this?
6 more answer(s) available.