Using Cinquain to Draw Summary from Books and Reading Part II

Their Eyes

On Tuesday, we posted a few pieces from our work with Zora Neale Hurston’s Their Eyes Were Watching God. I have added those to this post, but I have added a few new pieces that I got to draft with my other classes in order to really draw out this idea of using the cinquain of a means of drawing deeper connections to the text to invite personal responses that approach the analysis we want our readers to be doing at the higher levels of learning.

I’m still working with the idea to clarify how it meets the CCS or other State Standards in an effort to codify vs. poetically-render my idea here for use in the classroom. But I cannot help myself. As much as I would try to claim otherwise, I am a poet at heart.

Using Garland Cinquain to Analyze a Character from a Book

 

Chapter Two of Their Eyes Were Watching God:

 

Tender

kisses with boys

can lead to big trouble;

it must mean you’re a woman now,

changing.

 

Married?

It’s too early.

She knows nothing of it.

Couldn’t she wait just a bit more?

Too young.

 

To want

to be a tree–

want what nature promised,

waiting for pollen–bumblebees.

Marriage.

 

Unknown.

How she got here–

the mysteries of she–

born of another tree and time:

Nanny.

 

 Needful

for saftety now,

alone in the world

without a father or mother.

Girl.

 

 Tender.

It’s too early

want what nature promised

born of another tree and time

Girl.

 

Using Garland Cinquain to Analyze a Character’s Feelings from a Moment in a Book

 

Chapter Five of Their Eyes Were Watching God

 

Big Train

south to Maitland,

with Jody by her side,

ready to go rule the world.

Moving.

 

 Carry

her brand new dreams.

There’s a new town waiting,

everything she’s dreamed of inside.

New chances.

 

 Arrive

to find little

more than roots and dirt roads–

less than what she expected.

Dismayed.

 

 The speech

she wants to give

is quieted, quickly,

a voice as big as the world

building.

 

 Ready

to speak out now.

She’s aching to be heard.

This is what a woman sounds like

silenced.

 

 Big Train:

her brand new dreams–

more than roots in dirt roads–

a voice as big as the world

silenced.

 


 

Using Garland Cinquain to Explore a Minor Character (Symbolic) from a Book

 ***NEW PIECE***

Matt Bonner’s Mule

 

Skinny.

Most all raw-boned

Brutes are commanded daily.

Come up is seasoned with rawhide.

Worker.

 

Rib bones

used for scrub boards;

he’s fixed up for laundry,

clothes hanging on hock bones to dry.

Resigned.

 

Master

Waits with the whip;

there’s a field to be plowed.

Fighting inches in front of plows.

Submit.

 

Daily

mistreatment.

Always another job

to be done with an old mule’s back.

Nightly.

 

The feed

is the day’s wage

for the work that is done.

But tomorrows’ is not promised,

servant.

 

Skinny—

used for scrub boards.

There’s a field to be plowed,

to be done with an old mule’s back:

servant.

 

 

Using Garland Cinquain to Explore a Minor Character’s Role in Driving a Story Line

***NEW PIECE***

Logan—

lonely’s limit—

a story’s bit player

meant to last just one season:

husband.

 

The land

meant to protect

is simply a framing

of a young girl’s limitations,

the home.


 

The man

she wants to love,

he lacks the pretty bloom,

is hard to love the way he’s made:

burden.

 

Seasoned

like long winters

threatening her green time;

there is no springtime within him.

Ripened.

 

Fence rail,

the beckoning.

Simply a boundary,

like a page that comes to an end.

Chapter.

 

Logan—

meant to protect,

he lacks the pretty bloom.

There’s no springtime within him.

Chapter.

 

Using Cinquain to Analyze a Setting or People within a Setting

Fum’blin’

around time’s toes.

Porch-time interactions–

all ’bout da day’s nuttinness,

talking.

Stum’blin’

wit dey own thoughts,

arguin’ about dis-and-dat,

from da sun rise til da sun set

over.

 

Bum’blin’

wit opinions

playin’ da dozens

til someone gits reconciled

fin’ly.

 

Crum’blin,

the sun goes down

back inta da same earth,

and da sun pays ‘im rev’rence

passing.

 

Mum’blin’,

it’s beyond dem.

Each to dey own thoughts

words changed with the earth and wit the sky

Amen.

 

Fum’blin

wit dey own thoughts

til someone gits reconciled

and da earth pay ‘im rev’rence.

Amen.

 

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