2011B FRQ #1

Post date: Jan 21, 2014 3:13:26 AM

(Suggested time—40 minutes. This question counts as one-third of the total essay section score.)

Read carefully the following poem by Robert Pack, paying close attention to the relationship between form and

meaning. Then, in a well-written essay, analyze how the literary techniques used in this poem contribute to its

meaning.

AN ECHO SONNET

To an Empty Page

Voice:

Echo:

Start

Grief

Art

Leaf

Dies

See

Ease

Leap

True

Weep

You

How from emptiness can I make a start?

And starting, must I master joy or grief?

But is there consolation in the heart?

Oh cold reprieve, where’s natural relief?

5 Leaf blooms, burns red before delighted eyes.

Here beauty makes of dying, ecstasy.

Yet what’s the end of our life’s long disease?

If death is not, who is my enemy?

Then are you glad that I must end in sleep?

10 I’d leap into the dark if dark were true.

And in that night would you rejoice or weep?

What contradiction makes you take this view?

I feel your calling leads me where I go.

But whether happiness is there, you know.

Reprinted by permission of Robert Pack.