THE VOICE OF RAIN

Warm Up Exercise Name the seasons of India. What comes after summer ? Why do we like rainy season.

The Voice of the Rain And who art thou? Said I to the soft falling shower, which, strange to tell, gave me an answer, as here translated: I am the poem of Earth, said the voice of the rain, Eternal I rise impalpable out of the land & the bottomless sea, Up ward to heaven ,whence, vaguely from’d, altogether changed, & yet the same,

I descend to lave the droughts, atomies, dust layers of the globe, And all that in them without me were seeds only, latent, unborn; And forever, by day & night, I give back life to my own origin, And make pure & beautify it ; ( For song, issuing from its birth-place, after fulfillment, wandering Reck’d or unreck’d, duly with love returns.)

Difficult Words Impalpable:-Something that cannot be touched Lave:- Wash, Bathe Atomies:- Tiny Particles Latent:- Hidden

Important Points Personification is the literary device used in the poem. There are two speakers in the poem- the poet & the rainfall. The poem begins in a conversational tone. The first two lines form the question put by the poet to the rainfall & the rest constitute the answer of the rainfall. There is a parallel drawn between rain & music. Both originate from a source, rise up, reach fulfillment, wander about & finally return to their origin. The present poem is a Nature poem That deals with the cyclic movement of rainfall.

Questions Name the poem & the poet. Who does ‘I’ refer to in the first & third line in the poem. What do you understand by the phrase ‘strange to tell’ ? From where does rain originate & how? What happens to the rain in the sky? Why does the rain comes down? What for is rainfall compared to music? Why have the last two lines put within brackets? What is the rhyme scheme of the poem ? Speak about some benefits of music.

Home Assignment Write the summary of the poem in your own words. Write a paragraph on “Rainwater harvesting”.

Project Work Taking help from any geographic sourcebook, prepare a chart displaying the cyclic movement of rainfall. Write a poem on rainfall / rain on your own.

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