SSAT Middle Level Reading Practice Test 47

Home > SSAT Test > SSAT Reading Practice Test

First Song

Then it was dusk in Illinois, thesmall boy

After an afternoon of carting dung

Hung on the rail fence, asapped thing

Weary to crying. Dark was growing tall

And he began to hear the pond frogs all

Calling on his ear with what seemed their joy.

Soon their sound was pleasant for a boy

Listening in the smoky dusk and the nightfall

Of Illinois, and from the fields two small

Boys came bearing cornstalk violins

And they rubbed the cornstalk bows with resins

And the three sat there scraping of their joy.

It was now fine music the frogs and the boys

Did in the towering Illinois twilight make

And into dark in spite of a shoulder's ache

A boy's hunched body loved out of a stalk

The first song of his happiness, and the song woke

His heart to the darkness and into the sadness of joy.

-Galway Kinnell

1. The boy in the poem does all of the following EXCEPT

  • A. meet with two other boys.
  • B. play a musical instrument.
  • C. experience physical discomfort.
  • D. work hard during the day.
  • E. chase frogs with cornstalks.

2. What causes the boy to be a "sapped thing" (line 3) and "weary to crying" (line 4)?

  • A. His two friends do not meet with him as scheduled
  • B. Not having musical instruments of his own
  • C. The exhaustion brought on by a hard day's work
  • D. Having to mend the rail fence all afternoon
  • E. There is very little time to play before going home

3. Which of the following is a kind of contradiction mentioned in the poem?

  • A. the end of the afternoon and the start of nightfall
  • B. the sadness of tiring work and the joy of first song
  • C. the biting of tiny bugs and the music of pond frogs
  • D. the uproar of the city and the peace of the country
  • E. the harvesting of corn and the consuming of corn

4. The "small boy" (line 1) experiences happiness because of which of the following?

I. His musical abilities

II. The sounds made by frogs

III. The music of the night

  • A. III only
  • B. I and II only
  • C. I and III only
  • D. II and III only
  • E. I, II and III

5. It can be inferred from the poem that the boys

  • A. made the violins themselves.
  • B. take pride in working hard.
  • C. work together on the farm.
  • D. will be leaving Illinois soon.
  • E. fear that it is getting too dark.