The poem views the people or masses as the driving force behind all human achievements and progress. It describes the people as "the mob", "the crowd", and "the mass" who work as inventors, makers of food and clothes, and witnesses of history. Great leaders like Napoleon and Lincoln emerge from the people but eventually die, while the people remain as the "seed ground" that continues to create more leaders despite facing difficulties like plowing and storms.

1. I AM THE PEOPLE, THE MOB
CARL SANDBURG

2. I AM the people- the mob- the crowd-the mass.
Do you know that all the great work of the world is
Done through me?
I am the workingman, the inventor ,the maker of the
world’s food and clothes.
I am the audience that witnesses history. The Napoleons
Come from me and the Lincolns. They die . And
then I send forth more Napoleons and Lincolns.
I am the seed ground. I am a prairie that will stand
For much plowing . Terrible storms pass over me.
I forget . The best of me is sucked out and wasted.

3. The main theme of the poem
is, all human achievements are
the fruit of man’s labour. The
poem is a tribute to people, the
seed ground of progress.

4. DIFFICULT WORDS
• Mob – a large crowd of people.
• Witness – a person who sees an
event.
• Prairie – a large open area of
grassland, especially in
North America.
• Plough – a large farming implement
with one or more blades
fixed in a frame, drawn over
soil to turn it over and cut
furrows in preparation for the
planting of seeds.
•Suck – be very bad or unpleasant.

5. QUESTIONS
1)Who is the ‘I’ in the poem?
The ‘I’ refers to people.
2) How can ‘I’ be the people?
Each individual is an inevitable part
of he people. But often we forget this
fact and use the third person ‘they’ to
refer to the people, the faceless mass
who make up human civilization. So
the poet has deliberately used the word
‘I’ to refer to the people.

6. IMAGES IN THE POEM
Visual images : Is a mental image
that is similar to a visual
perception.
•The people, The Napoleons and
Lincolns, The prairie.
Auditory : Is a means of or
relating to the process of hearing.
•The terrible storms.

7. Do it yourself
•What are the words does
the poet used to describe
the people? Are they all of
the same meaning?