5.03 The Art of Language

To start this out, for number one we have "Peeking over the Smokies, greeting the faces." I would change the word peeking to either glimpsing or glancing. The reason for this is because I feel it matches better with the tone of the poem, and sends the message across better. "Each one yawning to life, crescendoing into our day" is the second one here on the list. I would change the word crescendoing to either launching or undertaking. First off, many people (not everybody) probably don't even know what the word crescendoing means, so this would give them a more familiar word. Also, I feel these words do a better job of describing what the author is trying to say here. Coming around for number three we have, "...hands gleaning coal or planting windmills..." In this instance I would change the word gleaning into either extracting or obtaining, as I feel it does a better job of sending a picture to the reader's mind of the actions occuring within this line. Number four brings us, "We head home: through the gloss of rain or weight of snow, or the plum blush of dusk..." I think that this line does a really good job of describing things, but I feel to make it even better the word gloss could be changed to either gleaming or brilliance. These two words help to better explain the magnificence of the weather being described here. To wrap this all up, the last line I would change is "...who couldn't give what you wanted." To make this line shine bright, the word wanted should be turned into either yearned or desired. The two words give the reader a more feeling of desirement/inspiration, which overall helps to advance the theme of inspiration that the author is trying to convey to the reader.

I used the built-in Google dictionary, provided by Oxford, to help me with my research for better words and synonyms. I would either research synonyms for a word, or lookup a definition to find a different word that helps fit the narrative much better.