Still working on the poem, To A Friend Whose Work Has Come to Nothing by William Butler Yeats. Here’s what I’ve memorized so far:
Now all the truth is out,
Be secret and take defeat
From any brazen throat,
For how can you compete,
Being honor bred, with one
Who were it proved he lies
Were neither shamed in his own
Nor in his neighbors’ eyes?
Bred to a harder thing
Than triumph, turn away…
Here’s another example of how looking for patterns can make memorizing a poem easier. This time the pattern is a lovely line of alliteration. The last word of the line that starts with the word bred is thing. The first word of the next line is than. Two words next to each other beginning with t (th really) provide a nice way to tie the next line with the one before it. Then, how handy that the next two words also begin with t. Patterns like that make a line very easy to remember.
The last word, away, illustrates another memorization technique (Poem Memorization Tip Number 17). Away starts with the letter A and follows a word starting with T. Sometimes well-known phrases with the same initials as the words I’m trying to memorize come to mind that help me remember the words. In this case T & A, of course, reminds me of tits and ass. I know, I know: you were so hoping this blog wouldn’t sink to these kind of tactics just to get more readers (I hope you took my advice and put the kids to bed before reading this), but guess what? I memorized this line (starting with a row of four T’s and ending with T&A) in a jiffy!
postscript: at least I didn’t include those two words as tags
