While we were fearing it

Reflective Prompt:
Have you ever spent a long time worrying about something, and by the time it finally happened, you felt too tired or numb to react?
Write about how that experience affected you.
Then, think about how that kind of emotional exhaustion shows up in Emily Dickinson’s poem “While we were fearing it.”

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What central idea is most developed in the poem?

• The fear of an event is often worse than the event itself.

• People are rarely prepared for the unexpected.

• Pain fades with time and distance.

• Tragedy strikes without warning.

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What effect does the repetition of “A Fitting—” in line 5 and 6 have on the tone of the poem?

• It creates a lighthearted and rhythmic mood.

• It emphasizes the speaker’s confusion.

• It reinforces the speaker’s emotional reaction to what has come.

• It signals a break in the poem’s meaning.

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Which best describes the shift between the first and second stanzas?

• A. The tone shifts from hope to defeat as the speaker loses all optimism.

• B. The focus moves from anticipating fear to experiencing the emotional weight of reality.

• C. The speaker turns from anger to forgiveness toward the person causing fear.

• D. The imagery shifts from nature to technology.

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What does the speaker mean by the lines “’Tis harder knowing it is Due / Than knowing it is Here”?

• The speaker means that anticipating a feared event is more difficult than actually facing it when it arrives.

• The speaker means that facing a feared event is more difficult than anticipating it.

• The speaker means that both anticipating and facing a feared event are equally difficult.

• The speaker means that it is easy to ignore a feared event.

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Which of the following best expresses the main idea suggested by the lines?

• It is more difficult to plan for the future than to reflect on the past.

• Once something frightening arrives, it becomes easier to handle than imagining it.

• Accepting loss is more painful than anticipating it.

• The speaker regrets not fearing the event more intensely.

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In both Chapter 1 of Night and Emily Dickinson’s poem “While we were fearing it,” fear plays a central role. How is fear described or experienced differently before and after danger arrives in each text? Use details from both the poem and Chapter 1 to support your answer.

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