Excel
Excerpt from If We Must Die
Claude McKay
1 If we must die, let it not be like hogs
Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot,
While round us bark the mad and hungry dogs.
Making their mock at our accursed lot.
5 If we must die, o let us nobly die,
So that our precious blood may not be shed
In vain; then even the monsters we defy
Shall be constrained to honor us though dead!
O kinsmen! we must meet the common foe!
10 Though far outnumbered let us show us brave,
And for their thousand blows deal one death-blow!
What though before us lies the open grave?
Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack,
Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back!
es - Which BEST identifies and analyzes this poem's rhythmic pattern?
McKay follows the basic form of a rhyming Shakespearean sonnet in iambic
pentameter, creating an effect of contrast and cacophony
Mckay follows the basic form of a rhyming Shakespearean sonnet in iambic
pentameter, creating an effect of continuity and fluidity
McKay follows the basic form of a blank verse Shakespearean sonnet in
lambic pentameter, creating an effect of continuity and fluidity
Mckay follows the basic form of a blank verse Petrarchan sonnet in lyric
pentameter, creating an effect of despair and disillusionment.