POEM OF THE MONTH

"Motto" by Langston Hughes

I play it cool
And dig all jive.
That's the reason
I stay alive.

My motto,
As I live and learn,
is:
Dig And Be Dug
In Return.

Questions for CAP Students Your email response should address all of the questions below. You do not need to write a 5-paragraph response. Answers should be done individually. You may talk about the poem with your classmates, but your email response needs to be yours alone and should not bear any resemblence whatsover to someone else's.

1. What do you think Hughes means by "jive" on line 2? Why did you come to that conclusion? And what does he mean when he says, "I play it cool"? What does "cool" mean?

2. What does "jive" mean now, to you, or at STA and NCS? Is it a compliment or an insult if something is "jive"?

3. Take a look at the two italicized lines that close the poem. What do they mean? 4. Overall, what is the narrator saying? What is the message (or what are the messages?)?

5. Please discuss Hughes's style here--the diction, tone, rhyme, short lines, two stanzas, italics, etc. Why do you think he structured the poem that way, and how, if at all, does the style correspond to the meaning?

6. Your response to the poem--like it, dislike it? Why?