Passage Cross-Purposes
Cross-Purposes
What I am is built: concrete and steel.
I defy gravity. I am what every athlete
wants: to remain at the apex of the leap,
up in the air. And yet I am useful, too:
cars, trucks, people, even trains
make their way across my broad back.
Swallows and ospreys nest in my trusses.
What I am is motion. I am water, and I am older
than anything else you know. No human
built me. I am gravity’s best friend; I pool
and flow wherever gravity takes me.
I am the blood flowing in the runner’s chest,
and I catch everything: from the hills,
the mountains. It all washes down through me.
What you are is an accident,
what happens to rain when rain gives in
to Earth’s gravitational pull.
You are some tears dribbling from a mountain’s
eye, running down the pavements
of small towns, into the cities, to the sea.
You are the path of least resistance.
What I am is power. You, of course,
have none: you are a static lump, an artifact
slowly decaying. But my regal flow
nourishes grasses, permits empires to rise.
Those who made you will break you,
in time, replacing you with yet another
clumsy structure. I have seen. I know.
“Clumsy”? Being rebuilt makes me
a friend of time, does it not? And it means
that I have siblings—those “clumsy” structures,
my sisters and brothers.
We stitch across the rip you make.
We are steel thread to the human needle.
We bind you up. We sew you.
And I sow into you; in every cranny
of your superstructure my vapors cling.
They bring out your softness, your rust.
Boast your best, and boast better yet.
I am listening to the bright hum
of the wind in your wires. Because I am,
above all else, patient. I will wait for you.
ospreys: large birds
Question
Read lines 2–4 and lines 12–14 from the poem.
I am what every athlete
wants: to remain at the apex of the leap,
up in the air.
I am the blood flowing in the runner’s chest,
and I catch everything: from the hills,
the mountains.
How do the lines contribute to the development of a central idea of the poem?
- AThey establish that both the structure and the water have endurance and control.
- BThey highlight that both the structure and the water are powerful and impressive.
- CThey suggest that the structure and the water are unaware of how similar they are.
- DThey reveal that the structure and the water are surprised that they are interrelated.
Show the answer
Correct answer: B
The answer is (B)
The question asks how the lines contribute to the development of a central idea in the poem. The lines “I am what every athlete / wants” (lines 2–3) and “I am the blood flowing in the runner’s chest” (line 12) communicate that each speaker is an object of admiration and a powerful force, so Option B is correct.
Option A is incorrect because nothing in the language of the lines communicates control.
Option C is incorrect because the lines describe opposing characteristics: the structure’s description conveys stillness—remaining “up in the air” (line 4)—while the water’s description conveys movement—“flowing in the runner’s chest” (line 12). Additionally, the idea that the speakers fail to recognize similarities is not part of a central idea.
Option D is incorrect because there is no evidence in the poem that the two speakers understand that they are interrelated.
Question analysis
Students compare two sets of lines from the poem “Cross-Purposes” in which the structure and the water each describe themselves through athletes, one leaping and one running. The question asks how these lines develop a central idea, which means comparing two images that seem opposite and deciding what the pairing adds.
- Grade level
- Grade 8 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Above grade 7 Typical grade 7 work asks what one image suggests. This question pairs images from two speakers in a two-voice poem and asks for a shared idea, with abstract choices that all sound plausible, which is above grade 7.
- Estimated difficulty
- Hard: combines ideas, needs a plan, and has more than one tempting wrong answer.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 3, strategic thinking · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- Figurative or literary language major
- Combines ideas moderate
- A very close wrong answer moderate
- Evidence
- Answered from several paragraphs or stanzas
- Reading level
- Passage: 316 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 7, 113 words.
- Students, last 30 days
- Not enough answers yet to show (it takes 10).
Why it is hard, traps and wrong answers (shows the answer)
Why it is hard
The athlete images point in opposite directions, one frozen in the air and one in motion, so students may look for a contrast when the question wants what the two share. Both speakers are borrowing the glamour of athletes to boast, which is what makes them powerful and impressive. The other choices either add a quality, control, that neither image carries, or credit the speakers with feelings the poem never shows.
Figurative or literary language major Understanding the question
Both claims are metaphors: the bridge is the athlete's dream of staying “at the apex of the leap,” and the water is “the blood flowing in the runner's chest,” so each image must be translated into a quality. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
Combines ideas moderate Working it out
The two sets of lines come from rival speakers in different stanzas, and the answer has to name one idea true of both, not of either alone. (Embretson, 1998; Daniel & Embretson, 2010)
A very close wrong answer moderate Choosing the answer
A and B share the frame “both the structure and the water” plus two qualities; A's endurance is close to B's power, and only its added “control” finds no support in the lines. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Strategy: For each set of lines, ask what the speaker claims about itself through the athlete image; then keep only a choice that fits both speakers and these exact words.
Traps
- Half right: One half of a two-part choice is right and the other is not.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
A Half right (King et al., 2004; Thissen, Steinberg & Fitzpatrick, 1989)
Hears stamina in the runner and in staying aloft, which is defensible, but nothing in either set of lines suggests control.
C Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Notices that both speakers use athletes and assumes they miss the likeness, an idea the poem never develops; the images actually set stillness against motion.
D Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads surprise into lines whose tone is boastful; neither speaker shows any sign of noticing a connection, let alone being surprised by it.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks how two sets of lines build a central idea. The structure speaks one set, and the water speaks the other. You need one idea that fits both.
Read both sets of lines
The structure says, in lines 2–4: “I am what every athlete / wants: to remain at the apex of the leap, / up in the air.”
The water says, in lines 12–14: “I am the blood flowing in the runner’s chest, / and I catch everything.”
Work out what each speaker claims
The apex is the very top. Every athlete wishes they could stay at the top of a jump. The structure stays up there all the time. So it brags that it does what athletes dream of.
The water says it is the blood that keeps a runner going. Both speakers compare themselves to strong athletes. Both are showing off how powerful and impressive they are.
Check each choice
- A Endurance (lasting a long time) could fit. But nothing in the lines shows control.
- B fits. Both speakers boast of being powerful and impressive.
- C The poem never says they don’t notice how alike they are.
- D Neither speaker shows surprise. Their tone is proud.
Choose the answer
Both sets of lines show the speakers bragging about their power. So the answer is B.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
A is the closest choice. Like B, it says something good about both speakers. But A adds “control,” and neither set of lines shows either speaker controlling anything. Every part of B fits both sets of lines, with nothing extra.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Cross-Purposes” as printed (pages 72–73)
