Once by the pacific how can you tell that this poem is a sonnet? in lines 2-6 what forces of nature seem to be personified?

Answer and explanation:

"Once By The Pacific" is a poem by author Robert Frost. We can tell the poem is a sonnet due to the way it is structured. Sonnets have 14 lines and a regular rhyme scheme. Also, they usually maintain a strict metric, commonly iambic pentameter - a five-time repetition of an unstressed syllable followed by a stressed one in each line. "Once By The Pacific" has all those characteristics:

The shattered water made a misty din.  A

Great waves looked over others coming in,  A

And thought of doing something to the shore B

That water never did to land before.  B

The clouds were low and hairy in the skies,  C

Like locks blown forward in the gleam of eyes.  C

You could not tell, and yet it looked as if  D

The shore was lucky in being backed by cliff,  D

The cliff in being backed by continent;  E

It looked as if a night of dark intent  E

Was coming, and not only a night, an age.  F

Someone had better be prepared for rage.  F

There would be more than ocean-water broken  G

Before God’s last Put out the light was spoken. G

As we can see above, the poem has 14 lines and its rhyme scheme is Shakespearean - AABB CCDD EEFF GG. Let's take a look at the first line to confirm the metric:

The shattered water made a misty din.

Iambic pentameter is used. The syllables in bold are the stressed ones. We have 5 pairs of unstressed followed by stressed.

Also, in lines 2-6, water and clouds are personified. Personification is a type of figurative language used to attribute human characteristics - qualities or action - to inanimate objects. The water is described as something that can look and think, while the clouds are described as locks of hair being blown.