Hayley Durham
Melinda Dinninger
Elizabeth Findlay
Kayla Pape


Speaker’s thoughts on Winter Storm

Cannot control or predict the elements

No one can control the elements

We survive the elements by a closed, sheltered life.


Control the Forces of Nature
•
• Man cannot hope to control nature
Can only sit out the storm in a shelter

Helpless Technology
•
• Barometers cannot change weather
Clocks can only tell the time, not change it


Mankind’s Inability to Control and Predict
•
• Weather
“Weather of the Heart”


Formal Lyric Poem

“Tells” the narration from the Speaker to the Reader


Strong Imagery Lines
•
• Lines 1 – 7
Lines 22 – 25

Helps Understand the Storm

Draws Attention to Contrast


Contrast Safety and Comfort
•
•
• Line 1
Lines 4 – 5
Lines 22 – 23

Helps “see” the Storm

Most Common Imagery Found


Appeal to reader’s Sense of Hearing
•
• Line 9
Line 24

Speaker Acknowledges the Presence of
Sound


Calm

• Helps analyze what is taking place
Resigned

• Knows hears the storm, but doesn’t act surprised
Thoughtful

• Literary meanings: Physical and Metaphysical
Optimistic Realist
• Natural occurrence that shouldn’t be fought


First Person
• Through eyes of speaker

Present Tense
• Happening in the “now”


Pleasant To The Ears

“P” Sound
• “Upon a pillowed chair”

“W” Sound
• “Moves inward toward”


Harsh, Sharp To The Ears

“K” Sound
• “curtains as the sky goes black”


Consecutive Sounds - Lots of “W”
• “What Winds are Walking overhead, What zone…”
• “Walk from Window to closed Window,
Watching…”


Repetition of Vowel Sounds

“A”
• “glAss hAs been fAlling All the Afternoon”

“I”
• “the wInd wIll rIse”


Looks Rhymed

•
•
•
•
•
Semi-Rhyme
Afternoon; Zone
Abroad; on
Time; rise
Black; glass
Season; regions


Rhymes Within the Lines
•
• Match; Glass
Weather; Aperture


Stresses in the Beginning


Example:
“And think again”
• Line 6

Not Consistent


Full Stop at End of a Line

Feeling of Completeness

Stream of Consciousness


Seems to be Sentence Makes a Stanza
• Lines 22 – 25
•
•
•
• “I draw the curtains as the sky goes black
And set a match to candles sheathed in glass
Against the keyhole draught, the insisting wine
Of Weather through the unsealed aperture.”


Pattern of Stressed and Unstressed
Syllables

Gives Rhythm when Lacking Rhyme


Comparisons using Physical and
Metaphysical

Turmoil of Weather and Heart
• Lines 13 – 14


Literal and Figurative: Giving it a Name

The Storm Becomes Abstract
•
• Line 2
Lines 3 – 5


Replaces a Word for Another

“The Glass has been falling all morning”
•
• Line 1
“glass” is a rain


Word represents Another

“The Glass has been falling all morning”
•
• Line 1
“glass” represents a Barometer


Contradictory, but True Phrase

Technology
• “Predict” the weather, but can’t “control” it


Direct Meaning of a Word

Literal Meaning

Example:
•
• “Silent Core of Waiting”
Eye of the Strom


Associated Meaning of a Word

Connective Meaning

Example:
•
• “Silent Core of Waiting”
Her peaceful area before the Storm


Significance in Poem

Representation

Example:
• “winds” symbolize power of sudden change


Straight Forward

Verbs:
• Falling, knowing, walking, moving, strain…

Adjectives:
• Grey, pillowed, closed, silent, secret, polar…


Alluding to Something

Winds “walking”
• Storm is on the Move

“Grey Unrest”
• Storm is right above the speaker


Emphasizes the Meaning of Poem

“Who live in troubled regions”
• Learn to Live

“Polar realms”
• Home is an isolated area


General English

No Complex Words

Easy to Read and Understand


Four Stanza

Not Closed Form

Blank Verse

Proper Usage of Stresses (Rhythm)

Slant Rhymes

Work Cited
"About Our Definitions: All Forms of a Word (noun, Verb, Etc.) Are Now
Displayed on One Page." Merriam-Webster: Diction. Merriam-
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“ webster.com/dictionary/diction>.
by Henri Cole. - Slate Magazine. Digital image. Slate Magazine.
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<http://www.slate.com/articles/arts/poem/2013/01/_the_bee_by
_henri_cole.html>.
Brain Pickings. Digital image. Brain Pickings RSS. 2013. Web. 04 Feb. 2013.
<http://www.brainpickings.org/index.php/2012/08/20/how-toread-a-poem-edward-hirsch/>.
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<http://www.teenink.com/reviews/all/article/74200/Storm-
Warnings-by-Adrienne-Rich/>.
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"Euphony." Dictionary.com. Dictionary.com, 2013. Web. 04 Feb. 2013.
<http://dictionary.reference.com/browse/euphony?s=t>.

Work Cited Continued
Girl Reading Poem. Digital image. 2013. Web. 4 Feb. 2013.
<www.frontporchrepublic.com>.
Poem of the Day. Digital image. Vanilla Joy RSS. 2013. Web. 04 Feb.
2013. <http://www.vanillajoy.com/poem-of-the-day.html>.
Spoken Word Poetry | Lit Drift: Storytelling in the 21st Century. Digital image. Lit Drift Storytelling in the 21st Century RSS. 2013. Web. 04
Feb. 2013.
Storm Warnings. Digital image. 2013. Web. 6 Feb. 2013.
<http://www.atmos.umd.edu/~dankd/adrienne.html>.
Telling Rhythm: Body and Meaning in Poetry [Hardcover]. Digital image. Amazon.com: Books. 2013. Web. 05