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Test: Common Core: 12th Grade English Language Arts
Passage adapted from Edna St. Vincent Millay's "Spring" (1921).
To what purpose, April, do you return again?
Beauty is not enough.
You can no longer quiet me with the redness
Of leaves opening stickily.
I know what I know. 5
The sun is hot on my neck as I observe
The spikes of the crocus.
The smell of the earth is good.
It is apparent that there is no death.
But what does that signify? 10
Not only under the ground are the brains of men
Eaten by maggots.
Life in itself
Is nothing,
An empty cup, a flight of uncarpeted stairs. 15
It is not enough that yearly, down this hill,
April
Comes like an idiot, babbling and strewing flowers.
| 1. | Which of these options accurately reflects the relationship between seasonal re-birth and death in the poem? |
Immortality is found through union with nature
Life is short, and so it is important to live fully and seize the day
Beauty and the apparent rebirth of nature in springtime do not make up for the ultimate reality of death
The rebirth of nature during springtime proves that life ultimately overcomes death
