Class 10 Poetry Mastery: Full Texts & Analysis
An interactive academic resource featuring full poem texts, detailed linguistic breakdowns, and comprehensive exercises.
Leave this Chanting and Singing
By Rabindranath Tagore
Leave this chanting and singing and telling of beads!Exhaustive Vocabulary List
Whom dost thou worship in this lonely dark corner of a temple with doors all shut?
Open thine eyes and see thy God, not before thee!
He is there where the tiller is tilling the hard ground and where the pathmaker is breaking stones.
He is with them in sun and in shower, and his garment is covered with dust.
Put of thy holy mantle and even like him come down on the dusty soil!
Deliverance? Where is this deliverance to be found?
Our master himself has joyfully taken upon him the bonds of creation; he is bound with us all forever.
Come out of thy meditations and leave aside thy flowers and incense! What harm is there if thy clothes become tattered and stained?
Meet him and stand by him in toil and in sweat of thy brow.
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Tiller | Farmer/Cultivator | Consumer |
| Pathmaker | Road builder | - |
| Mantle | Cloak/Holy robe | Bareness |
| Deliverance | Salvation/Freedom | Bondage |
| Tattered | Torn/Ragged | New/Whole |
Summary & Interpretation
Tagore argues that God is not found in the ritualistic isolation of temples but in the hard work of laborers. True worship involves serving humanity alongside those who toil in the dust and sun.
The Voice of the Rain
By Walt Whitman
And who art thou? said I to the soft-falling shower,Exhaustive Vocabulary List
Which, strange to tell, gave me an answer, as here translated:
I am the Poem of Earth, said the voice of the rain,
Eternal I rise impalpable out of the land and the bottomless sea,
Upward to heaven, whence, vaguely form'd, altogether changed, and yet the same,
I descend to lave the drouths, atomies, dust-layers of the globe,
And all that in them without me were seeds only, latent, unborn;
And forever, by day and night, I give back life to my own origin, and make pure and beautify it;
(For song, issuing from its birth-place, after fulfilment, wandering,
Reck'd or unreck'd. duly with love returns.)
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Impalpable | Intangible/Untouchable | Tangible |
| Lave | Wash/Bathe | Dehydrate |
| Drouths | Droughts/Dryness | Flood |
| Atomies | Tiny particles | Mass |
| Latent | Hidden/Dormant | Active |
| Reck’d | Heeded/Cared for | Unheeded |
Summary & Interpretation
The rain explains its life cycle—rising from the earth as vapor and returning as life-giving water. Whitman parallels this cycle to the way a song enriches the world before returning to its creator.
Climbing
By Amy Lowell
High up in the apple tree climbing I go, With the sky above me, the earth below.Exhaustive Vocabulary List
Each branch is the step of a wonderful stair Which leads to the town I see shining up there.
Climbing, climbing, higher and higher, The branches blow and I see a spire,
The gleam of a turret, the glint of a dome, All sparkling and bright, like white sea foam.
On and on, from bough to bough, The leaves are thick, but I push my way through;
Before, I have always had to stop, But to-day I am sure I shall reach the top.
Today to the end of the marvelous stair, Where those glittering pinacles flash in the air!
Climbing, climbing, higher I go, With the sky close above me, the earth far below.
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Spire | Steeple/Peak | Base |
| Turret | Mini-tower | - |
| Glint | Sparkle/Shimmer | Dullness |
| Pinnacles | High peaks/Summits | Bottoms |
| Marvelous | Wonderful/Superb | Ordinary |
Summary & Interpretation
A child’s imaginative ascent of an apple tree transforms it into a path toward a celestial city. It symbolizes the excitement of ambition and the magic of a youthful perspective.
Composed upon Westminster Bridge
By William Wordsworth
Earth has not any thing to show more fair: Dull would he be of soul who could pass byExhaustive Vocabulary List
A sight so touching in its majesty: This City now doth, like a garment, wear
The beauty of the morning; silent, bare, Ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples lie
Open unto the fields, and to the sky; All bright and glittering in the smokeless air.
Never did sun more beautifully steep In his first splendour, valley, rock, or hill;
Ne'er saw I, never felt, a calm so deep! The river glideth at his own sweet will:
Dear God! the very houses seem asleep; And all that mighty heart is lying still!
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Majesty | Grandeur/Dignity | Meanness |
| Steep | Soak/Saturate | Dry |
| Splendour | Brilliance/Magnificence | Gloom |
| Glideth | Flows smoothly | Stagnates |
| Mighty | Powerful/Great | Weak |
Summary & Interpretation
A sonnet that captures London in the stillness of dawn. Wordsworth finds a divine tranquility in the city's architecture before the industrial day begins.
Weathers
By Thomas Hardy
This is the weather the cuckoo likes, And so do I;Exhaustive Vocabulary List
When showers betumble the chestnut spikes, And nestlings fly;
And the little brown nightingale bills his best,
And they sit outside at 'The Traveller's Rest,'
And maids come forth sprig-muslin drest,
And citizens dream of the south and west, And so do I.
II. This is the weather the shepherd shuns, And so do I;
When beeches drip in browns and duns, And thresh and ply;
And hill-hid tides throb, throe on throe, And meadow rivulets overflow,
And drops on gate bars hang in a row, And rooks in families homeward go, And so do I.
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Betumble | Upset/Tumble | Order |
| Shuns | Avoids/Rejects | Welcomes |
| Duns | Dark/Dull colors | Bright colors |
| Throb | Pulsate/Beat | Stillness |
| Rivulets | Small streams | Oceans |
Summary & Key Themes
Hardy contrasts the joy and activity of Spring (Stanza I) with the cold, wet, and isolating atmosphere of Winter (Stanza II).
If
By Rudyard Kipling
If you can keep your head when all about you Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,Exhaustive Vocabulary List
If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you, But make allowance for their doubting too;
If you can wait and not be tired by waiting, Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,
Or being hated, don’t give way to hating, And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise:
If you can dream—and not make dreams your master; If you can think—and not make thoughts your aim;
If you can meet with Triumph and Disaster And treat those two impostors just the same;
If you can bear to hear the truth you’ve spoken Twisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,
Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken, And stoop and build ’em up with worn-out tools:
If you can make one heap of all your winnings And risk it on one turn of pitch-and-toss,
And lose, and start again at your beginnings And never breathe a word about your loss;
If you can force your heart and nerve and sinew To serve your turn long after they are gone,
And so hold on when there is nothing in you Except the Will which says to them: ‘Hold on!’
If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue, Or walk with Kings—nor lose the common touch,
If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you, If all men count with you, but none too much;
If you can fill the unforgiving minute With sixty seconds’ worth of distance run,
Yours is the Earth and everything that’s in it, And—which is more—you’ll be a Man, my son!
| Word | Meaning/Synonym | Antonym |
|---|---|---|
| Impostors | Deceivers/Fakes | Honest people |
| Knaves | Scoundrels/Villains | Heroes |
| Sinew | Muscle/Strength | Frailty |
| Virtue | Moral excellence | Vice |
| Common Touch | Humility/Simplicity | Arrogance |
Summary & Interpretation
A guide for developing character, resilience, and stoicism. Kipling lists the virtues required to maintain integrity in the face of both success and total failure.
