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1)I think that the poet is trying to make a point that he is stuggling to keep up to speed with others in life and that no matter how much effort he puts in, it's never enough to hold a candle to other people. This is supported  by how the poem states "your day pack heavy on my shoulders", symbolising a physical and/or metaphorical burden placed upon the poet,which he finds draining. The poet being behind is also made apparent by "From the start,you always walked a little faster" and how he is then said to quicken his pace in order to "make it on time". The poet's lack of stamina to go on is evidently shown by how he is tired even before he started climbing a flight of stairs,while someone else is "taking them in leaps by twos". The poet then likens himself to a tortoise, who crawls step by step to get around while the people who pass him by are taken to be hares surpassing him in terms of progress.These examples all point to the poet being unable to keep up,despite his best efforts.

2)This poem struck me as a cathartic release of the poet's bottled up feelings,as if the poet wrote this to vent his frustrations as to how unsatisfying he finds his life to be. I can definitely connect with the poem as the problem of always lagging behind is something i feel i constantly suffer from. This leads to me being able to empathise with the poet's feelings, and fully understanding why he feels this way regarding his situation.

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1) The writer portrays that his work is very tiring and exhausting and it affects how he looks at his future positively, even death. ‘I dont want to miss the meeting either but when we reach the steps im out’ shows how the write tries to keep his pace and tries not to miss work but in the end does not put in any effort to catch the ‘meeting’. The writer could even count his steps and this shows how slow he was going and he’s not speeding up at all.

2) I feel very disturbed after reading the poem as the writer is said to have “died” at the end of the poem. The poem shows different views on how the poet views life, death and work

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1) The writer portrays that his work is very tiring and exhausting and it affects how he looks at his future positively, even death. ‘I dont want to miss the meeting either but when we reach the steps im out’ shows how the write tries to keep his pace and tries not to miss work but in the end does not put in any effort to catch the ‘meeting’. The writer could even count his steps and this shows how slow he was going and he’s not speeding up at all.

2) I feel very disturbed

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1) I believe that the poet is trying to portray how exhausting her life is. How in life, time is always your worst enemy. When the poet said how "your day pack heavy on my shoulders,'" it is as if she is trying to show that she feels the weight of her burdens; physically and mentally, on her shoulders. Maybe this is outcome of when time did not give her the chance to overcome one problem before life decides to throw another one to you. Therefore, overtime, her problems will begin to stack up and thus becomes a burden for her. All this is because of how time is never sufficient.

Later in the second stanza, she explained, what i believe to be, how "from the start [time] have always walked a little faster and she pushed her pace, as if implying that she is working faster and harder to complete her daily tasks within the time given. However, she then continue to say that "when she reaches the steps, she's out." This is as if the poet is suggesting that when she is just about to reach her desired destination or simply to just accomplish her daily tasks, linking to the first stanza, due to the burdens she feel on her shoulders, the poet gets too tired and soon gives up.

2) I can strongly relate to the poet. Through this poem, it can be seen how your everyday problems, can literally be the death of you. Life will not always run as smoothly as you'd like it to be. As time pass, you will be able to feel the weight of the workload you have, on your shoulders, if you do not spend your time wisely. This thus may lead you to over think about many things and in the end you will just give up. However, through this poem, it has also opened up my eyes that even if i am facing a lot of obstacles in my journey through life, i should just hold on a little longer and discover the wonderful things that awaits me in the future.

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1) The poet is trying to tell us about how transient life is.
This can be seen when 'I' has been following 'You' throughout 'Your' day to day affairs. In the end, 'I' and 'You' would go off separate ways.
The poet could be hinting that 'I' is Time's perspective, where Time is being personified as a figure. The day pack that Time carries is a person's, or more specifically, 'Your' life. As the day starts, 'I' is carrying a 'day pack, and at the end, the pack he was carrying falls onto train tracks. This signifies that the heaviness in the pack could mean the start of 'Your' (a person's) life, where there are yet many things to be accomplished as time passes with 'You'. When 'You' were more youthful, the day is young, and Time shows no signs of catching up, 'You' will pass by events extremely quicky till 'You' will not notice at all. This is because of how 'You' 'taking in leaps by twos'.
As 'You' grows older, Time has caught up with 'You', and 'You' slow down. Now, Time has passed 'You' by, until it is time to pass on.
The once heavy day pack, no longer filled with achievements yet to he done, is empty, as it lays '[flat] on the track'. This highlights how when 'You' has attained everything 'You' needed to fulfill, it is time to go. Furthermore, Time slows are youre young and reaches 'You' as 'You' are older.
In a nutshell, the poet is wishing to convey how ephemeral life is.

2) This poem gives me an insight on opposites.
Throughout the poem, there is a stark contrast between many objects such as a heavy day pack and one that is so empty it flattens on the train track. Another example would be the description of a 'bright winter morning' versus 'your waving is a shadow'. The story of the Tortoise and the Hare is also mentioned, showing us the polarity between two very different creatures.
It is plausible that the poet is accentuating how pairs of opposite terms can be used to further emphasise the subject of the poem: beginnings and ends. The use of opposites is able to give the reader a more impactful and in depth meaning.

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1)The poet is trying to say that there is no use jumping through different aspects of life. Her observation of her life in paragraph 1 where she describes her regular day-to-day routine followed by mentioning her curiosity of the whereabouts of “you”. Then in paragraph 2, she says “ The hare is you, taking them in leaps by twos as if you’re born again and life is calling. I’m the tortoise.” this implies that the poet has a relaxed outlook on life, like the story of The Hare and Tortoise,  the poet believes in taking life slower to ensure the most satisfaction out of life.. Following suit in the third paragraph, the poet expresses her countenance of what usually is considered saddening like the idea of death by stating “By now your waving is a shadow. Our parting calls are echoes. See you later, I see you later.”. The poet does not seem to perceive death as the end of life, but rather another phase of it. I can tell that the poet is neither a pessimist nor is she an optimist, maybe she is a realist. Maybe the poet wants to display that her pragmatic way of living life is the most beneficial and ideal way to live, in contrast, the person “you” ended up stopping their life because of having a different pace living. Her clear emotional detachment can be the reason why she is still living, though it may not be as well as it should, she still is breathing.

2)I can can empathize with the poem. Though the meaning of the poem varies from person to person, i feel that the poet is going through a phase where she refuses to get too close to someone, risking emotional attachment. where everything around the poet is progressively moving faster, the poet is still stuck at her own pace, behind everyone else. as an adolescent teen in the 21st century, i can understand the unsettling feeling of not being on par with your peers. the poet is seen constantly trying to keep up with "you". it could be that the poet has accepted that she can never be on the same page as her peers, leading her to tear away in an attempt to protect herself and keep living. today's issues in the first-world environment, most are not physical factors like poverty or famines, but they are 'invisible' in the sense that there is no definite solution to entirely avoid circumstances that threatens someone's decision to stay alive.

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I believe the poet is trying to bring across the point that he feels really stressed out due to the heavy burden from work weighing on his shoulders. “ Always it is Friday” he emphasises the daily routine that he has to go through and it is obvious that he is growing bored of it. “ The day you missed the meeting and the phone took its full load “ In this quote, we can see that he was late for his meeting and is wanted to be there due to the phone taking the “full load” which may probably refer to the various missed calls he had received throughout the morning and this may not be the first time he had been through this as he had mentioned earlier “Always it is Friday”. This could probably also mean that he may be late almost every Friday and the day Friday is the last day of a weekday which shows his anticipation towards the end of a work week. “From the start, you always walked a little faster, I push my pace.” This particular quote indicates that he has big aspirations for his work life and he longs to reach his goal. Every time he feels as though he has been pushed back again and falling back to where he had started as he emphasised this once again with the phrase “always walked a little faster”. Even though he may feel demoralised, he constantly pushes himself to reach his goal and survive through the week.  “Life is calling. I’m the tortoise.” This phrase in turn relates to the saying “ Time and tide waits for no man. “ This could mean the poet is trying to bring out that the process of life goes on no matter how much you want it to stop and wait for you to catch up your pace. The poet also tries to compare life- the hare to himself- a tortoise and this indicates the contrast between the two. Along the journey to his workplace, he counts the litter on the ground while he crosses the bridge and this could refer to him counting his the number of steps he has to take in order to achieve his goals and expectations he had set for himself. “ Your pack hits the siding and collapses, flattening on the track. “ At last he mentions that the pack had hit the siding which could show that the heavy burden had finally been lifted off his shoulders and he felt as though “relieved”.

The poem makes me feel a feeling of sympathy as the feeling that life can sometimes be tough hits you and you feel as though you’re on the verge of giving up but no matter how much you try to keep yourself going, life just doesn’t seem to cooperate with you. Sometimes you may feel like breaking down because every time you try to pick yourself up, everything just falls apart and there you are; starting all over again, back to where you started. I am sure many people have had felt this at some point of their life when it was their toughest, as though you are out of breath and all you want is to take a break from everything so everything seems clear again.

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1. The poet could be trying to say that life is like a train journey and that we, as commuters, take the train every day with our duties and responsibilities, as if we are going to "work" when go through the days. "I" in this poem could also be the personification of life itself. The train journey visits different areas of our life, such as our daily routines and until the very end to our death. "Your day pack heavy on my shoulders" could be referring to the physical but also mental burdens of our daily lives. This is not necessarily confined to actual jobs but could also be the weight of our every day personal matters. People have their own burdens and responsibilities and they carry it on themselves every single day. Moving on, the poet talks about the "hare is [us]" and the '[life] the tortoise" The moral of the story is that sometimes, we get too overconfident that it leads to our downfall. Perhaps this is trying to say that sometimes people get too ahead of their situations in lives and that is exactly what led them to their ruin. This leads to the last part of the poem, which could be discussing deaths, as seen in "Your pack hits the siding and collapses, flattening on the track" This could mean that the burdens which we bore on our shoulders were suddenly tossed away right when we lost our lives.
2. This poem really connects with me on a personal level because it talks about things that most average people would experience in their lives. For example, the very fact that we are always rushing to complete something, or even the fact that sometimes life just takes us by surprise even though we think that we should have won the race. These are extremely relatable situations that could be applied to most aspects of life, whether it is work or studies. As students, we take this train of life every day while carrying the load of our academics on our shoulders. Also, we have to sometimes "crawl" through the different challenges that we face in life and sometimes it gets a little slow. But at the very end of the day, the poem reminds me that all of our worries disappear at one point in time.

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1) I feel that the poet is trying to clear a point that life is not an easy journey, it is full of struggles, and ups and downs but eventually you have to go through it and reach the final destination. The poet mentions that, "Step-by-step I crawl through litter counting up the forty-seven to cross the bridge and catch the train". The poet also tries to convey that life is a race, you have to travel quicker than other people in order to thrive in this world. This can be justified by, "I leave the house with you and walk quickly towards the train." The poet describes his hurry and rush in life and also the competition with the second character in the poem.

2)The poem makes me realize how difficult life is and how we have to live like a fighter. The struggles portrayed by the poet in the poem strikes me in the sense that it is necessary to move on no matter in which situation you are in under what circumstances. The poet also makes the comparison between a hare and a tortoise. The difference between the speeds of the relatively faster hare and the slower tortoise ends up in the hare winning the race and reaching the destination earlier than the tortoise whereas the tortoise struggles in his journey before doing the same. This is how I connect with the poem.

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1)i believe that the poet is trying to portray that her repetitive working lifestyle has caused her to lose optimism , despite her efforts to catch up. in the first stanza, the poet states how she "walk[s]quickly towards the train" , contrasting to the last stanza , where she "crawl[s] through litter". this quotation shows how her attitude towards work and life in general has changed drastically , from trying to push herself and get ahead faster (walks quickly) , to slowing down and taking her time(crawls). this indicates how she had lost most of her enthusiasm towards work and life , as she slows her pace , taking it a little easier on herself instead of the usual rushing.

2) i cant helped but feel a little troubled and sad by the poem . the poem revolves around work life , which ultimately ended in the death of the person she was talking about. the part that really troubles me is the fact that no matter how hard the poet tried to catch up with the 'you' in the poem , death was still inevitable and caught up with the person first. this stood out to me as in a real world scenario, no matter how much we try to catch up with someone or something , we would all be greeted by death and all that would remain would be memories that would eventually fade. this is shown when the poet says "By now your waving is a shadow. Our parting calls are echoes". this shows how 'you' had died , and the echoes she hears are recollections of what they used to say to each other. this evokes sadness in me , as this is something everyone would have to face and there is no way to avoid having the fate of 'you' in the poem.

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1) The poet is trying to make a point that life has it's own flaws, in that for humans to survive and get through life is by working, to the extent of being overworked and that sometimes, some of us, as humans just could not take it and eventually starts to place their sight on death. "Your day pack heavy on my shoulders", this phrase shows a hint of the poet is trying to say that having an occupation and holding all the responsibilities is a burden in life. It holds back our freedom and happiness in life. "I don't want to miss the meeting either." shows the poet is telling us that no matter how tough it is, we, humans are forced to go on and continue our daily task in life in order for us to be able to live on in the unfairness of this life. As sometimes it might get too tiring , "But when we reach the steps, I'm out" it shows that the the poet is telling us that humans can reach their limit of how much they can endure,  maybe this said person is too overwhelmed and has reached his limit and causing some negative thoughts that somehow death is better than living in this unfair life.

2) The poem has changed  the way I looked towards some aspects of life, in that having an occupation and living an adult life is way tougher than I had ever imagined. Unfortunately, life is unfair and sometimes what life brings to us seems way more dangerous. The closure to the poem, it's as if the poet met a bad ending in his life. I can connect to this poem in a way that life is unfair towards us, humans. When we do go through some bad phases in life, it affects us emotionally and physically, affecting our thoughts towards life.

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1) I think that the point the poet is trying to make through the poem is his attitude towards his work and life in general. Throughout the poem, the poet shows an attitude of tiredness towards his work. In fact, the poet states that the poet doesn't "want to miss the meeting either," but when the poet "reach(es) the steps (the poet is) out." From this, I can see that the poet wants something, in this case, not missing the meeting, but is too tired and lazy to work for it . Another point the poet might be trying to convey is how he feels that he has died on the inside doing his job.When he describes 'you' as a hare "taking (the steps) in leaps by twos as if 'you're' born again and Life is calling.(the poet) is the tortoise." From this,I believe the poet is trying to say that he/she and the 'you' in the poem were already dead on the inside from working for so long but when 'you' started working hard, the poet describes 'you' as 'you' are being reborn and given a new life.Therefore ,the poet might be expressing his lack of care and effort in his/her work and life in general and also how he/she views death as.

2)Despite being a poem about the stresses of work, life and death,it made me feel motivated to be like the 'you' in the poem and not the poet.The poem showed me a view that I can see myself going to if I continue my ways of laziness.The poem gave me a clear mind of my future and made me realise the stresses of life and death and how hardwork is essential to getting our 'wants.'

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1) I believe that the poet is trying to portray his attitude towards his work which is very exhausting making him lose his optimism towards life. The poem states "I don't want to miss the meeting either. But when we reach the steps I'm out." This shows how the poet is trying to catch up with the fast pace of his work but he was still late probably due to how tired he is from work. "Always it is Friday, the bright winter afternoon, the day you missed the meeting and the phone took its full load, leaving us wondering where you'd gone". This shows that the poet might be already late for work and how his phone is full of calls due his late coming has shown that he might be an important person at work, and with his absence, people are panicking. This also shows two possibility of why the poet was late, first, he might have woken up late due to how tired he is from work or second he is generally done with his work, losing all his enthusiasm and optimism towards both work and his life.
2) The poem strikes me with a thinking that life isn't always that smooth and goes your way. As time passes, a large amount of workload might be difficult for us to handle and eventually make us lose our enthusiasm and optimism towards life. Slowly pushing us to have the horrible mindset of wanting to give up, to just let all go and die. But from this, I feel that I am prepared to face the difficulties in the future and shall not give up so easily.

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1) I think the poet is trying to say that her repetitive routine of life is exhausting. This can be seen in the poem as the poet states that 'Always it is Friday, a bright winter afternoon' . 'From the start ,you have always walked a little faster, I push my pace.I don't want to miss the meeting either.The hare is you, taking them in  leaps by two as if you're born again and Life is calling. I'm the tortoise.'

The poet might be saying that she keeps needing to rush against time, in which is personified as a person as 'You', in order not to be late for her work (don't want to miss the meeting).

2) The poem strikes me in the way that the poet compares herself racing with time to the story of the Hare and the Tortoise. Time always seems to move ahead of her, but she makes an effort to move faster than time so as to fulfill Life's expectations (e.g. Work) . I can connect with the poet's idea of racing against time as I feel that living in a fast paced society, it is inevitable for most to make use of our limited time in everyday life to do what is expected of us

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1) I believe that the poet's point is to tell the reader about  the troubles  we as humans face daily by recounting his own troubles. By writing "the day you missed the meeting and the phone took its full load" It tells us that the poet has a lot of work that he either "missed" or ignored. The poet wrote earlier that " your day pack heavy on my shoulders " creates the feeling of stress and burden he is feeling because of the amount of work he is needed to do . By writing  " Always it is Friday" this tell us this was not the first time he faced with this problem in his work , later the poet went on writing " Leaving us  wondering where  you'd gone" means the poet is asking where did his freedom went too and hoping his burden in his life of working would disappear.
The poem later tell us about the poet life in the beginning and how it ends this can be shown from the poem where it states that"From the start , you always walk a little faster " and "your pack hits the siding and "collapses flattening on the track." This first sentences could mean his expectations or goal that he wants to achieve is getting harder to achieve as stated that it " always walk a little faster." The second sentence tells us how it ends where he "part" with the burden as it " (slide) and collapses " "on the track."
This therefore is the poet's point in telling us the troubles we face and the wanting to achieve a goal as shown when the writer wrote " i dont want to miss the meeting either." meaning he does not want to fail his goal.
2). The poem shows the aspects of life , work , death and the troubles we could face in it however instead of making feel troubled or stress , it makes me feel more prepared . Life is shown to be tough and hard in the poem however adding more worry on top of the stress that is created would only slow us down and in the end stop us from achieving our goals

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1) The poet tries to portray that his work is exhaustive and that it affects his optimism towards life and death. The poet says that, " I don't want to miss the miss the meeting either. But when we reach the steps I'm out." shows how he tries to keep pace as he did not want to miss his work but eventually slowed down and derives to the fact that he was tired from his work and that one key point is that his work is in the afternoon which gives the possibility that he might've woken up later. This shows how he becomes easily pessimistic by showing how he treats work from going to the venue with a gloomy attitude.

2) What the tortoise and the hare relates to the themes, of which one is the will of being optimistic in such constraining conditions, is that the hare is a concept of being energetic despite the obstructions laid whereas the tortoise reflects upon the slow and gloomy mindset it treats about work, life and death. Secondly, another theme it connects to is the connection of work with people's lives and that the hare is determined to get things done by being punctual whereas a tortoise isnt.

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1) I believe that the point he is trying to make is to show the daily life of a himself and his opinion of certain things in life . About how tired the poet seems to  be towards life , as can be seen by  the sort of attitude he gives , the poem states that " I don't want to miss the meeting either . But when we reach the steps I'm out " , which can show that he is tired and seems to be counting the amount of steps he has to take before he can reach his destination which seems to combine a sense of tiredness and possibly dread as he is walking slowly even though the poet has a meeting to catch yet he does not rush to catch the meeting and walks slowly and walks so slowly that he even seems to be able to count the steps before he reaches his destination which just seems to show how tired he is that he walks so slowly , which seems to support the fact that he is tired of life  . Another point that the poet could be trying to show is that he seems to be carrying not only his own burden and troubles but also another persons burden on his shoulders  Because the poem states " your day pack heavy on my shoulders " usually when people use this phrase it shows that they are carrying some problems either mentally or physically , and maybe the poet is trying to express his troubles through the  poem .
2) The poem make me feel troubled and distressed . Because it seems to be showing different aspects of things , such as work , life and death . It makes me think about these aspects and regarding the aspect of death it seems to make me feel depressed as it shows how tired the poet was before and how the poet seem to have "died " in the ending of the poem itself . I feel sad as the writer seem to be having such a tiring time and in the end the ending seems to be even sadder to the end as the poet seem to have met a sad ending to conclude his sad life . I feel that i can connect to the poem as i sometimes feel that life is extremely tiring as there are many troubles and I feel that life gives us many obstacles to try and overcome which can sometimes be extremely tiring to do so as its challenging and i myself have gone through such phases in life and i feel that i can relate to how the poet is feeling

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1) The point that the poet is trying to make is that we shouldn't take our life for granted  and we should never take shortcuts in life This can be seen in "From the start, you always walked a little faster, I push my pace. I don't want to miss the meeting either. But when we reach the steps I'm out"  This shows that while the tortoise(poet)  is pushing his pace everyday the hare takes a shortcut.

2) The poem makes me feel encouraged to push myself even more and to stop taking shortcuts as I should learn how to do things the hard way also. If I keep pushing my pace, I will have a growth mindset and will be able to solve difficult problems

Yes. I do connect with the poem because in the past, I always had a fixed mindset and always use to be like the hare instead of the tortoise but after reading this poem, I started to have a growth mindset like the tortoise who loves to push his pace everyday to climb up the stairs

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Your day pack heavy on my shoulders
I leave the house with you and walk
quickly towards the train. Always
it is Friday, a bright winter
afternoon, the day you missed
the meeting and the phone took
its full load, leaving us
wondering where you’d gone.

From the start, you always walked
a little faster, I push my pace.
I don’t want to miss the meeting
either. But when we reach the steps
I’m out. The hare is you,
taking them in leaps by twos
as if you’re born again and Life
is calling. I’m the tortoise.

Step-by-step I crawl through litter
counting up the forty-seven
to cross the bridge and catch the train.
By now your waving is a shadow.
Our parting calls are echoes. See you
later, I see you later. Your pack hits
the siding and collapses,
flattening on the track.

Joan Michelson

1) What do you think is the point that the poet is trying to make through the poem?

2) How did the poem make you feel?
-> Striking aspects of the poem
-> Do you connect with the poem?