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POETRY LESSONS FOR THE ENGINEER.

Poetry Optimised forEngineeringMinds

POEMS Program, Lesson 1

We chose for our first lesson the sonnet Ozymandias, by Percy Bysshe Shelley.

There was good reason for the choice. In fact, there were five good reasons:

*By comparative standards, Ozymandias is short and relatively easy to interpret.

We wanted you to feel comfortable and confident from the beginning.

*The sonnet focuses on one of the most pervasive themes -- with its associated

moral message -- in the English poetic tradition. Development of skills used in

identifying and rationalizing thematic content and specific messages is an

essential goal of this program. It demonstrates stylistic effects -- specifically in

the form of tone and imagery -- that are central to both a competent

understanding and aesthetic appreciation of the poem. Building an awareness

and appreciation of style is a major emphasis of the program. *It demonstrates

applications of modal expression (i.e., presentational format) and point of view

(i.e., the speaker, speaker's role, direct or attributive sources of idea content

and communicative intent), which constitute an integral part of the analysis of a

poem and its critique. *Despite the alleged "obviousness" of the poem, we

submit it offers an intellectual, moral and aesthetic impact of perennial value.

These qualities, arguably, are what has made it a universal favorite -- a

"classic," if you will.

 

OZYMANDIAS By Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792-1822)

 

I met a traveller from an antique

land

Who said: Two vast and trunkless

legs of stone

Stand in the desert...Near them, on

the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies,

whose frown,

And wrinkled lip, and sneer of

cold command,

Tell that its sculptor well those

passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on

these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them, and

the heart that fed:

And on the pedestal these words

appear:

"My name is Ozymandias, king of

kings:

Look upon my works, ye Mighty,

and despair!"

Nothing beside remains. Round the

decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless

and bare,

The lone and level sands stretch far

away.

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POEM 2

Kahlil Gibran

Your clothes conceal much of your beauty,

yet they hide not the unbeautiful.

And though you seek in garments

the freedom of privacy

you may find in them a harness and a chain.

Would that you could meet the sun

and the wind with more of your skin

and less of your raiment,

For the breath of life is in the sunlight

and the hand of life is in the wind.

Some of you say,

"It is the north wind who has woven

the clothes we wear."

And I say, Ay,

it was the north wind,

But shame was his loom,

and the soften- ing of the sinews was his thread.

And when his work was done

he laughed in the forest.

Forget not that modesty

is for a shield against the eye of the unclean.

And when the unclean shall be no more,

what were modesty but a fetter

and a fouling of the mind?

And forget not that the earth delights

to feel your bare feet

and

the winds long to play with your hair.