Student Question
What literary devices are present in the provided untitled poem?
Walking through a field with my little brother Seth
I pointed to a place where kids had made angels in the snow.
For some reason, I told him that a troop of angels
had been shot and dissolved when they hit the ground.
He asked who had shot them and I said a farmer.
Then we were on the roof of the lake.
The ice looked like a photograph of water.
Why he asked. Why did he shoot them.
I didn't know where I was going with this.
They were on his property, I said.
When it's snowing, the outdoors seem like a room.
Today I traded hellos with my neighbor.
Our voices hung close in the new acoustics.
A room with the walls blasted to shreds and falling.
We returned to our shoveling, working side by side in silence.
But why were they on his property, he asked.
Quick answer:
The poem employs several literary devices, including vivid imagery with scenes like snow angels and a frozen lake. Similes compare the ice to a "photograph of water" and the snowy outdoors to "a room." Metaphors liken snow angels to a "troop of angels" shot down. Personification is seen in "voices hung close," and hyperbole in "angels dissolved." Alliteration occurs in "pointed to a place," and repetition in the brother's persistent questioning about the angels.
There are quite a few literary devices used in this poem First, the visual images stand out: a field, snow angels, a frozen lake, a "photograph of water," the snowy outdoors, a room "blasted to shreds," and shoveling. Also, there are some auditory images, with the shot, the ongoing conversation, the hellos, the "new acoustics," the blast, and the "silence" at the end.
The author uses a couple of similes, first saying "the ice looked like a photograph of water," and later that "the outdoors seem like a room" when it's snowing.
He also uses metaphors, first comparing the "angels in the snow" to "a troop of angels (that) had been shot and dissolved when they hit the ground," then the frozen surface of the lake to a "roof," and finally the snowy outdoors to "a room with the walls blasted to shreds and falling."
Personification is also used when the author says the speaker's and neighbor's "voices hung close in the new acoustics."
Hyperbole also appears when the author says the troop of angels had "dissolved when they hit the ground," and that the snowy outdoors had its "walls blasted to shreds and falling."
The author uses alliteration when the poem's speaker says he "pointed to a place" in the first line, and later that he and his brother were "working side by side in silence."
Finally, the author uses repetition in the way the brother keeps returning to the story about the angels being shot: "Why he asked. Why did he shoot them," and later, "But why were they on his property, he asked." He cannot get the gruesome image out of his head, and his sibling is left to wonder why he/she made up such a terrible story.
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