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Question
At times, especially when you are frustrated, you wish you were an animal/ a bird/ a fish/ a butterfly and not a human being. Say which of the above you would choose to transform to and give 3 or 4 reasons for your choice.
I wish I could be a ______________________________
_________________________________________________
_________________________________________________
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Solution
When I am frustrated. I wish I could be a bird, so I could fly away from the cause of frustration. At such times, I would like to be far from the noise and crowd on earth and sail in silence across the sky. I would prefer to concentrate on my own thoughts and regain my peace, and the best place for that would be up in the heavens, close to God. Flapping my wings would keep me active and busy and help me forget about my worries.
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RELATED QUESTIONS
I think I could turn and live with animals, they are
so placid and self-contain’d
I stand and look at them long and long.
They do not sweat and whine about their condition,
They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins,
They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God,
Not one is dissatisfied, not one is demented with
the mania of owning things.
Not one kneels to another, nor to his kind that
lived thousands of years ago,
Not one is respectable or unhappy over the whole earth.
So they show their relations to me and I accept them,
They bring me tokens of myself, they evince
them plainly in their possession
I wonder where they get those tokens,
Did I pass that way huge times ago and negligently drop them?
(A1) Complete the following sentences with the help of the poem.
(a) The poet wishes he could.............................
(b) Animals do not complain about............................
(c) Animals do not merely discuss.............................
(d) Animals are not crazy about .............................
(A2) The qualities of animals that highlighted by the poet in the poem are
.............................................................................................................
............................................................................................................
..........................................................................................................
(A3) Name and explain the figures of speech.
“I stand and look at them long and long.’’
What are the ‘tokens’ that the poet says he may have dropped long ago, and which the animals have kept for him? Discuss this in class .
(Hint Whitman belongs to the Romantic tradition that includes Rousseau and Wordsworth,which holds that civilisation has made humans false to their own true nature.
What could be the basic aspects of our nature as living beings that humans choose to ignore or deny?)
Complete the following.
Animals do not complain about _________________.
Complete the following.
Animals are not crazy about ________________.
State whether the following statement is true or false.
Animals quarrel for their possessions.
Read the text again, and complete the web, highlighting the good values/habits which we can learn from animals.

Read the poem again and write an appreciation of the poem in a paragraph format with the help of given points.
Points
- Title
- Poet
- Rhyme scheme
- Favourite line
- Theme/Central idea
- Figures of speech
- Special features - Type of the poem, language, tone, implied meaning, etc.
- Why I like/dislike the poem.
Why does the poet wish to 'turn' and live with animals?
Mention any two reasons why Walt Whitman appreciates animals more than humans.
List any two things that animals do and humans don't.
