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Pre-Performance Poetry Reflection

Before you perform your poem, I want you to write about it. Each part of the assignment is worth 10 points and is to be completed in Google Classroom:

1. Type your poem out - be sure to write the title and author.
2. In a paragraph, explain what you think this poem means. Why do you think the author wrote it? What sort of mood or feeling does it give?
3. In another paragraph, explain why you chose this poem. What is it about the poem that speaks to you? (And just so you know, “It was the shortest poem I could find” is not an acceptable response!)


Here is an example from a previous performance I did a few years ago:

Fish Story

by Richard Amour

Count this among my heartfelt wishes:

To hear a fish tale told by fishes

And stand among the fish who doubt

The honor of a fellow trout,

And watch the bulging of their eyes

To hear of imitation flies

And worms with rather droopy looks

Stuck through with hateful, horrid hooks,

And fishermen they fled all day from

(As big as this) and got away from.

This is a poem about a fish story, but from the fish’s point-of-view instead of the human.  Everyone seems to have a fisherman in their family who has a tale to tell of “the one that got away.”  The family members all ooh and aah when said fisherman talks about how, “I once caught a fish this big,” and in a flourish, shows with exaggerated enthusiasm, the size of the fish that he caught, though conveniently no one has seen.  Richard Armour takes that fish story cliché and turns it on its heels by giving it a different perspective – from that of the fish.  Of course, the fish doesn’t tell of the size of the human they caught, but instead the size of the one they got away from (rather than the one that got away).  So of course, the mood of this poem is very lighthearted and humorous, which is always what fish stories are, whether told by human or fish!

What speaks to me about this poem is that I have many men in my family who are fishermen (though not very good ones!) so it’s always funny to hear them talk about fishing and their good-natured ribbing of each other’s lack of talent when it comes to catching anything of substance.  My dad, grandpa (who is now passed), uncle, and brother all love to fish so fish stories abound in my family!  When all of them get together and talk about fishing, everyone always has to laugh at the bantering back and forth between them.  When the men talk about fishing, you can always guarantee that laughter will soon accompany the conversation.  So when I read this poem, I always think of the men of my family and smile because I imagine the fish who is telling this story is the one that got away from either my dad, grandpa, uncle, or brother.