English Grade 9

2. Learning Competency
Analyze literature as
means of connecting to the
world

3. Topic 1
By: Edward Field

4. My happiness depends on an electric appliance
And I do not mind giving it so much credit
With life in this city being what it is
Each person separated from friends
By a tangle of subways and buses
Yes my telephone is my joy
It tells me that I am in the world and wanted
It rings and I am alerted to love or gossip
I go comb my hair which begins to sparkle
Without it I was like a bear in a cave

5. Drowsing through a shadowy winter
It rings and springs has come
I stretch and amble out into the
sunshine
Hungry again as I pick up the receiver
For the human voice and the good
news of friends

6. VOCABULARY
1.Amble- slow walk
2.Drowsing- sleeping
3.Credit- appreciation

7. About the Author
EDWARD FIELD
- Was born on June 7, 1924 in Brooklyn New
York
- An American writer and poet
- Received a Lamont Poetry Prize

8. The Telephone
The poem is a commentary on the
invention of telephone.
It is taken from “Counting Myself Lucky”,
a compilation of Field’s poem.
The theme is self-identity or happiness
The narrator explains how the telephone
made him feel connected to others, how it
give him pleasure to share gossips.

9. The predominant feeling of the speaker in
the poem is serious in his declaration that
telephone is the source of his happiness.
According to the speaker, friends are
disconnected because of distance.
The speaker justifies his joy of having a
telephone by stating his reasons such as it
makes him feel connected to the world, and it
gives him pleasure.

10. The speaker compare man’s situation
before the advent of the telephone to
a bear.
People nowadays value telephone or
cellphones.
The literary device used is simile.
(man’s situation to a bear)
The speaker is hunger for love and
gossip.