A Stormy Welcome Reread the second stanza of the poem, on
page 2. How does the poet structure this stanza
to reveal the struggle the speaker faces?
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I wake this morning to pouring rain
and a bird belting out her feathery blues.
Not rain like it rained in the place we just came from-
that was drizzly, chilly, misty, German rain,
as polite and vague as a ticket conductor
on the trains we used to take back there, back then..
This is crashing angry, tropical Singaporean rain,
more like a temper tantrum than mere weather,
I jump when the thunder bellows,
and the lightning strikes the pre-dawn dark
like the furious flash of an eye.
The poet has the speaker move between different
rooms to highlight the confusion she is
experiencing
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The poet begins and ends the stanza with an
image of a bird to suggest the speaker wishes to
run away
The poet uses unsentimental dialogue to contrast
the father's later concern for the speaker.
The poet uses a richly described flashback to
emphasize the intensity of the speaker's emotions.
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