A Bus Along St. Clair: December / Freeway 280

				A Bus Along St. Clair: December / Freeway 280 A Bus Along St. Clair: December 1. What is the setting, or place, at the beginning of this poem? What is the general atmosphere of this place? 2. According to the third stanza, what has happened to the speaker? Who might the speaker be in this poem? 3. In the last five stanzas, what does the speaker tell the person being addressed? What message do the speaker’s words convey to you? 4. What does the title add to your understanding of the poem? 5. What do you think the speaker’s last statement,” your place is empty” means? Do you agree with the speaker? 6. Which of the images in the poem best matches your own experiences of being in a dense urban area? Freeway 280 - Text 1.What does the speaker say that the freeway conceals? What might have gone on there in the past? 2. In stanza two, what remains despite the freeway? What does their presence tell you about them? 3.What did the speaker want from the freeway? How does she or he seem to feel about it now? 4. Do you think the speaker will find “that part of me” that he or she is hoping to find in line 22? 5. In your opinion, how do the Spanish words enhance Cervantes’ poem? How would the poem be different without them?