“Yet Do I Marvel” Introduction

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“Yet Do I Marvel” Summary

“Yet Do I Marvel” Themes

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  God and Human Suffering

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• 

  The Difficulty of Being a Black Poet

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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Yet Do I Marvel”

• Line 1

  I doubt not God is good, well-meaning, kind,

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 2-4

  And did He stoop to quibble could tell why
  The little buried mole continues blind,
  Why flesh that mirrors Him must some day die,

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 5-6

  Make plain the reason tortured Tantalus
  Is baited by the fickle fruit,

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 7-8

  If merely brute caprice dooms Sisyphus
  To struggle up a never-ending stair.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 9-12

  Inscrutable His ways are, and immune
  To catechism by a mind too strewn
  With petty cares to slightly understand
  What awful brain compels His awful hand.

  

  

  

  

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• Lines 13-14

  Yet do I marvel at this curious thing:
  To make a poet black, and bid him sing!

  

  

  

  

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“Yet Do I Marvel” Symbols

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  The Mole

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• 

  Tantalus's Fruit

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  Sisyphus's Stairs

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“Yet Do I Marvel” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Diacope

  

  

  

  

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• Asyndeton

  

  

  

  

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• Alliteration

  

  

  

  

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• Assonance

  

  

  

  

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• Enjambment

  

  

  

  

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• Allusion

  

  

  

  

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• Imagery

  

  

  

  

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• Irony

  

  

  

  

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“Yet Do I Marvel” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Stoop
• Quibble
• Tantalus
• Baited
• Fickle
• Merely
• Brute
• Caprice
• Sisyphus
• Inscrutable
• Immune
• Catechism
• Strewn
• Petty
• Awful
• Marvel
• Bid

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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Yet Do I Marvel”

• Form

• Meter

• Rhyme Scheme

“Yet Do I Marvel” Speaker

“Yet Do I Marvel” Setting

Literary and Historical Context of “Yet Do I Marvel”

More “Yet Do I Marvel” Resources

• External Resources

  • A Reading of the Poem — Watch a reading and discussion of the poem by Todd Hellems for the Favorite Poem Project. 

  • Biography and Poems — Read a biography of Countee Cullen and find links to more of his work at the Poetry Foundation.

  • The Harlem Renaissance — Read an introduction to the Harlem Renaissance, the movement with which Cullen is most associated.

  • Countee Cullen Reads Aloud — Listen to a recording of Cullen reading one of his most famous poems, "Heritage."

  • An Essay on Cullen — Read an essay on Countee Cullen by Major Jackson, adapted from his introduction to Countee Cullen: The Collected Poems.

• LitCharts on Other Poems by Countee Cullen

  • From the Dark Tower

  • Incident

  • Tableau