Page 112 - 100 Best Loved Poems - Teaching Unit
P. 112
“anyone lived in a pretty how town”
by e.e. cummings, pages 91-92
Vocabulary
[none]
1. Who is “anyone”? Describe “anyone”’s relations to “noone.”
Anyone is a man who is different than anyone else in the town, and so he is hated. Anyone
is loved by noone, as the line, “anyone’s any was all to her,” suggests.
2. What tense is the poem written in? Does the tense shift at all?
The poem is written in the past tense until “anyone” and “noone” are buried. The poem
then becomes present for a single stanza, suggesting that death and the eternal life that
follows is constantly ‘present.’
3. What does the rearrangement of the seasons and stellar beings suggest about time?
The rearrangements keep the same circular order, suggesting that time is also circular, yet
ever-changing.
4. The only two capitalized words of the poem are “Women.” Why do you suppose
Cummings capitalizes them?
The capitalizations both follow the only two full stops of the poem (periods). Cummings
may be signifying the beginning quality of women, suggesting that everything, including the
poem, begins with a woman.
T-94
