Tone and Mood in Poetry

Read the following poem, "A Birthday" by Christina Rossetti and answer the question below.

My heart is like a singing bird Whose nest is a weathered shoot;

My heart is like an apple-tree

Whose boughs are bent with thick-set fruit;

My heart is like a rainbow shell That paddles in a halcyon [peaceful] sea;

My heart is gladder than all these

Because my love is come to me.

QUESTION: What mood do the details of the poem convey? (Look specifically at the three things the speaker compares her heart to.)

• Sorrow

• Happiness

• Excitement

• Nervousness

The definition of mood is 

• the overall feelings or emotions in the writer.

• revising your writing so that it is free of errors.

• overall feelings or emotions that are created in the reader. 

• working with a partner to check your writing. 

The air breathes frost. A thin wind beats Old dust and papers down gray streets And blows brown leaves with curled-up edges At frightened sparrows on window ledges. What is the mood?

• joyful

• annoyed

• gloomy

• puzzled

I have seen machines eating houses

And stairways walk all by themselves

And elevator doors opening and closing And people disappear.

What is the mood?

• fearful and confused

• jealous and annoyed

• heartbroken and bitter

• irritated and embarassed

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

What is the mood?

• sorrowful

• irritated

• puzzled

• apprehensive

I Dream a World by Langston Hughes

A world I dream where black or white,

Whatever race you be,

Will share the bounties of the earth

And every man is free,

What is the mood?

• hopeful

• fearful

• agitated

• puzzled

Don’t show me frogs and snakes

And listen for my scream,

If I'm afraid at all

It’s only in my dreams.

What is the mood?

• confident

• frightened

• lonely

• melancholy

But a caged bird stands on the grave of dreams

his shadow shouts on a nightmare scream

What is the mood?

• joyful

• heartbroken

• embarassed

• thrilled

The ill­fated ship set sail in late November; it was already listing as it left the harbor. I remember my mother anxiously looking toward the ominously darkening sky. Before nightfall, dreadful weather caught up with us, and the storm raged on for hours, tossing the ship violently. We were terrified as the night grew darker; we could tell the list was getting worse. By morning we knew that our worst fears were being realized; we would have to use the lifeboats if we were going to survive. We prepared to abandon the doomed ship.

The mood of this passage could best be described as

• gloomy

• lighthearted

• excited

• sarcastic

Mood and tone are the same thing.

• True

• False