| Constanly Risking Absurdity Constantly risking absurdity and death whenever he performs above the heads of his audience the poet like an acrobat climbs on rime to a high wire of his own making and balancing on eyebeams above a sea of faces paces his way to the other side of the day performing entrachats and sleight-of-foot tricks and other high theatrics and all without mistaking any thing for what it may not be For he's the super realist who must perforce perceive taut truth before the taking of each stance or step in his supposed advance toward that still higher perch where Beauty stands and waits with gravity to start her death-defying leap And he a little charleychaplin man who may or may not catch her fair eternal form spreadeagled in the empty air of existence |
| .1. To what sort of performer is the poet compared? The poet is compared to a acrobat. 2. Name at least 3 feats of the poet/performer. He has to balance the eyebeam, walk across the high rope, and perform a death-defying leap. 3. What picture of the poet does Ferlinghetti create by calling him a "little charleychaplin man?" Contrast this image with that of beauty in lines 25-26. What does this contrast suggest about the relationship between a poet and art? Create links to Charley Chaplin information sites or to a Charley Chaplin short feature on the web. He makes him silent and never quite knowing how to do things. Click here to see a Charley Chaplin video clip. 4. Define realist. Since super means both "above" and to "a greater degree, what two ideas about poetry does Ferlinghetti suggest when he says that the poet is a "super realist." A realist is a practitioner of artistic or philosophic realism. Farlinghetti tries to portray poets as "going beyond reality" because super is above or to a greater degree and realist is somebody who tries to recreate reality. 5. Find three example of Ferlinghetti's inventiveness with language (puns, compound words, etc.) and describe the effects of each. He uses "sleight-of-foot" and "eye beam" as puns and "charleychaplin" and "spreadeagled" as compound words. 6. What is the tone of the poem? Explain. The tone of the poem could be considered inspirational because the author makes the acrobat sound like he looks death straight in the face and spits on him every single day. |