Read the following poem and try to answer the questions given below:
Leisure
What is this life if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare?
No time to stand beneath the boughs
And stare as long as sheep and cows.
No time to see, when woods we pass,
Where squirrels hide their nuts in grass.
No time to see, in broad daylight,
Streams full of stars, like skies at night.
No time to turn at Beauty’s glance,
And watch her feet, how they can dance.
No time to wait till her mouth can
Enrich that smile her eyes began.
A poor life this if, full of care,
We have no time to stand and stare.
W.H. Davies
Questions
- When do we have no time to stand and stare?
- If we had time to stand and stare what would we see?
- What has Beauty been compared to?
- Just as care and stare have the same sound, i.e., they are rhyming words, find out the other combinations of rhyming words in the poem.
Answers
- We have no time to stand and stare when our life is full of work and worry.
- If we had time to stand and stare we would see the squirrels hiding their nuts in grass, and the water glittering in the sunlight.
- Beauty has been compared to a young girl dancing.
- boughs-cows
pass-grass
daylight-night
glance-dance
can-began.
