1a. What fruits are "fit for the highest prize at parish fairs"?
2a. What sweeps through the speaker's body?
3a. Identify two types of hunger.
4a. What effect, or emotional impact, do the images in the poem create for the speaker?
1b. What images recall the past for the speaker?
2b. How does the speaker feel toward "the old, familiar ways"?
3b. Which type of hunger is the speaker of this poem experiencing? How do you know?
4b. If you were the speaker, what would you do to reconnect with your tropical homeland and make your homesickness diminish?
Tone. What is the tone in each stanza? Is the tone in stanza 1 similar to the tone in stanza 3? Explain.
Meter and Rhyme. Fill in the chart below to indicate the poem's rhyme scheme. The first stanza has been done for you.
1a. 2a. 3a.
1b. abab 2b. 3b.
3. What rhyme scheme does the poem repeat in each stanza? What examples of a sight rhyme did you find? What is the poem's meter?
1. Imagine that you are a tourist in Jamaica. Write a postcard describing the landscape in front of you.
2. The speaker expresses his hunger for "the old, familiar ways." Write a paragraph contrasting the speaker's life in New York with the life he left behind in Jamaica. You may rely on your imagination to fill in details.
3. Write a lyric poem in which the speaker is an American living abroad who feels nostalgic for the United States. What sight might trigger his or her memories of home? Use Claude McKay's poem as a model. You may or may not want your poem to rhyme.
Using the Active Voice. Rewrite the following sentences using the active voice.
1. The fruits at the fruit stand were admired by the speaker.
2. Prizes were awarded by the judges at the parish fair.
3. The tree was filled with bananas.
4. The speaker was flooded with memories of Jamaica.
5. The speaker was overcome with longing for "the old, familiar ways."
Using Colorful Modifiers.Identify some modifiers in the poem and note what mood the adjectives lend to each noun and to the overall selection.
