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 line 7 from the first stanza.
Swallows and ospreys nest in my trusses.
How does the line contribute to the development of ideas in the stanza?
- AThe line supports the structure’s claim that it is beneficial to nature.
- BThe line reveals that the structure secretly envies the water’s importance in nature.
- CThe line emphasizes that the structure is more valuable to nature than the water is.
- DThe line reveals the kinship that nature shares with the structure.
Show the answer
Correct answer: A
The answer is (A)
The question asks how the line contributes to the development of ideas in the stanza. The line mentions swallows and ospreys, birds that use the structure’s trusses as their home; this reference supports the claim that the structure is beneficial to nature, so Option A is correct.
Option B is incorrect because the line doesn’t hint at jealousy in the tone or language, but rather the line is promoting the structure’s helpful characteristic.
Option C is incorrect because, in the line, the structure is not making a comparison with the water.
Option D is incorrect because, in the line, the structure is not implying that it is related to nature but rather that it is helpful to nature.
Question analysis
This question focuses on the first stanza of “Cross-Purposes,” in which a built structure describes itself, and asks what the line about swallows and ospreys nesting in its trusses adds. The line is short and plain, but students need to read it as part of the whole stanza and know that trusses are a structure's load-bearing framework.
- NYS standards
- 7R5 structure and genre features
- Grade level
- Grade 6 reading and task
- Compared with grade 7
- Below grade 7 Explaining what one line adds to its own stanza matches the grade 6 standard on how a sentence fits into a text. The line is plain and the stanza short, so this is below typical grade 7 demand.
- Estimated difficulty
- Straightforward: two steps or one careful reading.
- Thinking it demands
- Depth of knowledge 2, skills and concepts · mainly analyze
- What makes it hard
- How, not what minor
- Figurative or literary language minor
- A very close wrong answer minor
- Evidence
- Answered from one paragraph or stanza
- Reading level
- Passage: 316 words (a poem; reading level not measured); question and choices: about grade 6, 77 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 line is plain and follows directly from the stanza's claim that the structure is useful, so most students who read the stanza in order find the key. The wrong choices import the poem's later rivalry with the water, or a sense of family that comes later and refers to other structures. Students who keep to the first stanza, where the water has not yet spoken, avoid them.
How, not what minor Working it out
The line follows “And yet I am useful, too,” so its job is to extend the structure's usefulness from cars and trains to birds. (Anderson & Krathwohl, 2001)
Figurative or literary language minor Understanding the question
The speaker is a personified bridge boasting about itself, and the birds in its “trusses” are offered as one more reason to admire it. (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994; Kintsch, 1998)
A very close wrong answer minor Choosing the answer
A and C both say the line shows the structure's value to nature; C differs only in adding “than the water is,” a comparison the first stanza, where the water has not yet spoken, never makes. (Embretson & Wetzel, 1987; Gorin & Embretson, 2006; Ascalon et al., 2007)
Strategy: Read the stanza's sentences in order and note what each says about the speaker; then ask what the line about the birds adds to that picture.
Traps
- Wrong part of the text: A choice is true of another paragraph, stanza or speaker than the one asked about.
- Reads too much in: A reasonable-sounding conclusion that goes further than the text allows.
The wrong answers, classified
B Wrong tone or attitude (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Imagines envy of the water, but the first stanza never mentions the water and its tone is proud, not jealous.
C Wrong part of the text (Kirsch & Mosenthal, 1990)
Brings in the later contest over usefulness to nature, when the water says its flow “nourishes grasses”; the first stanza makes no comparison.
D Reads too much in (Graesser, Singer & Trabasso, 1994)
Reads nesting birds as a family bond, a step beyond the line, which shows the structure helping nature; the “siblings” come later and are other structures.
Working it out, step by step
Figure out what the question asks
This asks what one line adds to the first stanza. A stanza is a group of lines in a poem, a bit like a paragraph. Read the whole stanza to see where the line fits.
Read the stanza in order
Line 4 says: “And yet I am useful, too.” Lines 5–6 list who uses the structure: “cars, trucks, people, even trains.” Then line 7 says: “Swallows and ospreys nest in my trusses.”
The footnote says ospreys are large birds. Swallows are small birds. Trusses are the frame of beams that holds up a bridge.
Work out what the line adds
Lines 4–7 list ways the structure is useful. First it helps people and their cars and trains get across. Line 7 adds that it helps animals too: birds make their homes in it. So the line shows the structure is good for nature, not just for people.
Check each choice
- A fits. Birds nesting there support the claim that the structure helps nature.
- B The water isn’t even mentioned yet, and the tone is proud, not jealous.
- C This stanza makes no comparison with the water.
- D Kinship means being family. The line shows help, not family. The “siblings” come later, and they are other structures.
Choose the answer
The line backs up the structure’s claim that it is good for nature. So the answer is A.
Why this answer and not the closest wrong one
C is the closest trap. Like A, it says the structure helps nature. But C adds “than the water is.” In the first stanza the water has not spoken yet, so no comparison is made. A says only what the line shows.
More questions like this
The original DOE question
The passage “Cross-Purposes” as printed (pages 72–73)
