Tone. Tone is the emotional attitude toward the reader or toward the subject implied by a literary work. As you read, pay attention to how the tone changes in each stanza.
Meter and Rhyme. The meter of a poem is its rhythmical pattern. A poem is made up of rhythmical units, called feet. Types of feet include iambic, trochaic, anapestic, dactylic, and spondaic. (For definitions of these terms, see the entry on meter in the Handbook of Literary Terms.) Rhyme is the repetition of sounds at the ends of words. One type of rhyme, end rhyme, is the use of rhyming words at the ends of lines. A sight rhyme, or eye rhyme, is a pair of words, generally at the ends of lines of verse, that are spelled similarly but pronounced differently. As you look at “The Tropics in New York,” try to figure out its meter and rhyme scheme.
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Perhaps reflective of McKay’s own experience of emigrating to the United States from Jamaica, the speaker in “The Tropics in New York” is reminded of his former life in the tropics and longs for its old and familiar ways.
Describe a time you felt homesick. What did you miss most about home?
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