The End and the Beginning

1. A. Szymborska describes the jobs as manual labor and commonplace jobs that everyday people in a village or town would have to do following the destruction of a war.

2. B. The majority of the imagery used is domestic or of the house and home, suggested by everyday details (e.g., sofa springs, windows, and doors).

3. D. The poem begins in the direct aftermath of the war, highlighting the ramifications of war on a community.

4. A. While this image could be interpreted in multiple ways, it most likely represents the first post-war generation that will be unfamiliar with the toll the war took on the older generations and on their home. This is clear in the penultimate stanza when the speaker states:

Those who knew

what was going on here

must make way for

those who know little.

And less than little.

And finally as little as nothing. (Lines 37-42)