Question

read the poem. there are several questions about this poem. there are 21 lines in the poem. the poem is numbered every 5 lines. a sonnet is a rhyming poem with 14 lines. petrarch and spenser were european poets who became famous for their sonnets. american sonnet we do not speak like petrarch or wear a hat like spenser and it is not fourteen lines like furrows in a small, carefully plowed field but the picture postcard, a poem on vacation, that forces us to sing our songs in little rooms or pour our sentiments into measuring cups. we write on the back of a waterfall or lake, adding to the view a caption as conventional as an elizabethan woman’s heliocentric eyes. we locate an adjective for the weather. we announce that we are having a wonderful time. we express the wish that you were here
10
and hide the wish that we were where you are, walking back from the mailbox, your head lowered as you read and turn the thin message in your hands.
15
a slice of this place, a length of white beach, a plaza or carved spires of a cathedral will pierce the familiar place where you remain, and you will toss on the table this reversible display: a few square inches of where we have strayed
20
and a compression of what we feel. how do lines 10-12 mainly contribute to the meaning of the poem?
○ 1. the lines show the reader that messages on a postcard are customary and unoriginal.
○ 2. the lines reveal the contrast a typical recipient sees between the two sides of a postcard.
○ 3. the lines hint at the feelings of the recipient who will later read and discard the postcard.
○ 4. the lines help the reader appreciate the superiority of a postcard to an old - fashioned poem.

Explanation:

To solve this, we analyze each option:

• Option 1: Lines 10 - 12 don't focus on postcard messages being unoriginal. They're about the sender's and recipient's feelings, not the customariness of messages. Eliminate.
• Option 2: Lines 10 - 12 ("We express the wish that you were here / and hide the wish that we were where you are, / walking back from the mailbox, your head lowered...") show the contrast between the sender's hidden wish (to be where the recipient is) and the recipient's action of reading the postcard. The recipient sees the postcard's message ("wish you were here") but the sender has a hidden opposite wish, creating a contrast in perspectives. This fits.
• Option 3: The lines don't hint at the recipient discarding the postcard. They describe the recipient reading it, not discarding. Eliminate.
• Option 4: The poem doesn't claim postcards are superior to old - fashioned poems. It's about the nature of postcard communication, not comparing to sonnets. Eliminate.

Answer:

1. The lines reveal the contrast a typical recipient sees between the two sides of a postcard.