Investigate, Inquire, and Imagine, page 894

Recall

1a. Who has come to stay at the speaker's house, and what adjectives are used in the first three lines to describe her?

2a. In what ways do the people in the house try to cheer up the seamstress?

3a. What questions does the seamstress raise in the mind of the speaker?

Analyze

4a. A pun is a play on words, one that wittily exploits a double meaning. What pun exists in the name Clotho, applied to the seamstress?

Perspective

5a. Explain why the seamstress is so unhappy with her life.

Interpret

1b. How would you describe the seamstress's attitude toward life?

2b. What is unusual about the way in which the seamstress watches television? about her clothing? about the way in which she asks for money for buttons? What do these things reveal about her?

3b. How does the speaker feel about the seamstress staying longer than she was supposed to stay?

Synthesize

4b. What fears about her own fate does the seamstress raise in the speaker?

Empathy

5b. If you were the speaker, what counsel would you give the seamstress?

Understanding Literature, page 894

Tone. Review the cluster chart you made in Literary Tools. What is the tone of the speaker toward the seamstress? Why does the speaker take this tone?

Allusion. To which of the three Fates in Greek mythology does the speaker allude in the final stanza of the poem? Why is this choice of allusion particularly appropriate?

Writer's Journal, page 895

1. Write a want ad that the speaker would have placed for a seamstress. Include mention of the living arrangement.

2. Write an advice column in which you respond to the speaker's complaints about her house guest.

3. Imagine that you are the seamstress. Write a journal entry in which you describe what it is like for you to work as a seamstress in the speaker's house.

Integrating the Language Arts, page 895

Language, Grammar, and Style

Commas and Semicolons. Rewrite the following sentences, adding the appropriate punctuation.

1. The seamstress referred by a friend came to live with us for a month.

2. We fed her entertained her and tried to make her happy.

3. The seamstress watched television she didn't mind the zigzags.

4. She had wanted to take her vows as a nun move into a convent and serve God.

5. I wasn't entirely happy with her work however I paid her what we had agreed upon.

Applied English

Reference.Write an honest reference for the seamstress, including personality traits so that prospective employers know what she's like.