TISSUE Imtiaz Dharker

This resource is useful for teachers and students exploring this rather obscure poem. It contains teaching on the poetic techniques used by the poet , and seeks to help students engage with the issues explored in the poem: conflict in today’s world, the question of identity, and the fact that nothing is lasting.
Explaining to students the poet’s wish that buildings could be turned into paper, and that human tissue or skin is like paper, is a daunting prospect. The resource aims to help teachers and students who are wrestling with the poem. It is written in language accessible to year 10 and 11 students, and can be used by teachers for at least two lessons; firstly as a study guide to the poem, and secondly as an assessment task or worksheet. It contains a set of ten questions, with marks allocated. The answers are provided, within the resource, but must, obviously, be detached before handing out the resource to students. There is the suggestion at the end that this poem might well be compared with ‘Ozymandias’ as both poems deal with the same issues: that man-made objects do not last, however ambitious human beings might be.