Poetry Homework 2

Ok. This is not a 'kiddy' poem. Try it out.

When I realised I wasn't so brave after all by Alex Chaplin

Everyone had jumped the ditch on the building site.
It was about five wide, fifteen feet deep with wooden stakes
driven into the bottom
If I fell in I would most certainly break a few bones
My shoes were clogged and leaden with mud.
I didn't want to jump.
The others sitting on the other side were jeering me on.
I denied being afraid.
I stood at the slipper edge of the ditch and looked down at
the blunt, yellow, roughly hewn stakes
sticking at odd angles
The smooth wet walls of the ditch.
The wet, red, muddy ground on either side.
I took a few paces backwards and began to run.
My nerve failed me at the edge. I stopped dead almost sending myself in.
I eye the others.
They knew I couldn't do it.

Questions.
1. Explain why the boy did not want to jump the ditch. Give as many reasons as possible.
2. Explain why the boy was under pressure to jump across the ditch. What evidence can you find in the poem?
3. "I denied being afraid".
Why do you think the boy did this?
4. Describe an experience that you had when you were afraid to do something but you felt a lot of presure to do it anyway. How did you cope with the situation?