‘Your Cigarette Burnt the Savannah Grass’ Poem

Read the poem below and answer the questions that follow.

Your Cigarette Burnt the Savannah Grass.
    Come
    Listen to a boiling pot
    torch its heart and tell me
    What do you hear?
    the sun sent down sowers of it
    that burnt to cinder your eddying conscience
    the earth at the touch of your fingers
    cracked

    Colour melts at your stare
    Orange white blurred and all
    are the same to you
    Your cigarette burnt the savannah grass
    The scorpion bit me and I cried.
   Charles Owuor

Questions

i)    Identify and illustrate any three appeals the persona puts across to his adversary   (3 marks)
ii)    What is the subject matter of this poem?   (3 marks)
iii)    Identify and explain any three aspects of style and explain their functions.    (6 marks)
iv)    Explain the meaning of the following lines.  (4 marks)
         (a)    ‘Come
        Listen to a boiling pot’
    (b)    ‘ the sun sent down showers of it that burnt to cinder your eddying conscience!            
(v)    What is the mood of the poem?  (2 marks)    
(vi)    What is the persona’s attitude towards his adversary?  (2 marks)

Your Cigarette Burnt the Savannah Grass ANSWERS

    (i)    The persona appeals for three things.
        Sight – “colour melts at your stare”
        Touch – touch in heart
        Hearing – “listen to the boiling pot”                                     (3 mks)
       (ii)    The subject matter of the poem.
        – The persona making an invitation to his foe / adversary.
        – Accuses him for being the cause of discomfort he’s experiencing.
        – Persona is offended by the adversary and suffering – in pain. (e.g colour melts your taste)         (3 mks)
      (iii)    Aspects of style.
       (a)   Rhetorical question     – “What do you hear”?
                        – Provocable to readers’ / audience feeling.
       (b)   Personification        – ‘touch its heart’ – the boiling pot is personified to have a heart.
       (c)   Imagery            – metaphor ‘boiling pot’                            (6 mks)
     (iv)     (a)    The persona calls / invites his adversary to come and experience the trouble / discomfort that he has caused.
               (b)    It implies an incitement that has resulted to betrayal of his disappearing conscience.            (4 mks)
     (v)    Desperate/ hopelessness / disillusion (mood) – “The earth at the touch of your fingers cracked”
                            the scorpion bit me and I cried.”                     (2 mks)
     (vi)      Attitude
        – Dislike / disdainful / unforgiving.
        – The persona feels betrayed his adversary.