61 pages • 2 hours read
Marilyn C. HiltonFull Cicada Moon
Fiction | Novel | Middle GradeA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Part 2, Poems 63-79Chapter Summaries & Analyses
Part 2: “Spring 1969”
Part 2, Poems 63-67 Summary: “One Way” to “Kind Of”
In “One Way,” Mimi wonders why her friends Stacey and Timothy come to her house but never invite her to theirs. In “Mama’s Visitor,” Mama’s new friend from the wives’ tea, Dr. Haseda, comes to visit. She brings lemon cookies as an omiyage and Mama makes tea. Dr. Haseda was born in Los Angeles, went to college in New York (where she met her husband), and now teaches Japanese at Hillsborough College. She brought her one-year-old daughter, Kate. Mama gives her the nickname Baby Cake, which everyone, including Kate, calls her. Though Mama had said she only needs Papa, Mimi, and the turkeys, Mimi is glad she has a new friend. When Dr. Haseda leaves, Mimi says it was nice of her to visit. Mama admits that Papa asked her to. Mimi asks if she is mad at him, but Mama says what he did is love. In “Spatial Reasoning,” Mimi’s guidance counselor, Mrs. Golden, thinks her score on spatial reasoning is a mistake because girls never score high on the test. She looks at Mimi and waits for her to explain how a girl could score as high as a boy. When Mimi admits she liked the test and it was easy, Mrs. Golden says something went wrong and she has to take it again.
In “Looking Forward,” Mrs. Golden gives Mimi her schedule for the next year. Mimi asks if she can swap home economics for shop. Mrs. Golden frowns and asks why she would want to do that—she learns how to make things in home economics. Mimi says that she already knows how to cook and sew. Mimi remembers “drip, drip, drip” (166) and respectfully asks if she can swap them. Mrs. Golden says she doesn’t know what she did or was taught in California, but it is impossible in Vermont. Girls don’t take shop, and boys don’t want to take home economics. In “Kind Of,” Stacey tells Mimi that her father finally let her get the album she wanted. She invites Mimi to come over, but Mimi reminds her that she can’t. Stacey explains that it’s different now because her mom met Mama at the wives’ tea. Mimi doesn’t know what Mama said or did to change Stacey’s mom’s mind, and though she wants to say yes she doesn’t want to go only when Stacey’s mom says she can. She tells Stacey she has a lot of homework and it isn’t a good day. Mimi knows that Stacey knows what she’s really thinking because Stacey is her best friend. Stacey asks if she can come tomorrow and asks Mimi not to be mad at her. Mimi lies that she isn’t and admits to herself that seeing Stacey sad kind of makes her happy.
Part 2, Poems 68-71 Summary: “Moon Viewing” to “Dress, Hair, and Makeup”
In “Moon Viewing,” Mimi presents her moon project in class. Her classmates ignore her when she asks if anyone wants to look through the holes and see the phases of the moon. Mrs. Stanton asks everyone to pay attention before requesting to look. Mimi tries hard to smile in front of the class without breaking apart. She pretends she doesn’t see the kids making squint eyes at her as Mrs. Stanton gazes at the moon. In “The A Group,” Mimi’s project is one of the 10 science projects in the A group that will be judged for first, second, and third prizes in the Science Groove. Mimi is thankful to Mrs. Stanton for not ignoring her as she presented her project and for putting her in the A group with an A plus. In “Best Friends Always,” Mimi isn’t mad at Stacey anymore and hopes she isn’t either. She calls Stacey and they apologize to each other, agreeing to be best friends always. Stacey asks if Mimi wants to come over on Saturday to get ready for the dance together. Mimi is still hurt from when Stacey’s mom did not want her to visit and asks Stacey to come over instead. Though Stacey insists that it’s okay, Mimi insists too. Stacey finally agrees, making Mimi feel a little better.
In “Dress, Hair, and Makeup,” Mimi reminisces about how she would watch shows with Auntie Sachi, wear her makeup, and dance. The Spring Fling, however, is her first real dance. Stacey comes home with Mimi after school to get ready. Mimi opens the windows because the warm May air puts her in the mood for getting ready for her first dance. Stacey’s white and violet dress made of dotted swiss is from a store called Bonwit Teller in Boston. Mama made Mimi’s dress from the robin-egg’s blue silk Auntie Sachi sent. Stacey says Mama is talented and asks if she makes all of Mimi’s clothes. Mimi feels guilty for wishing her dress were from Bonwit Teller. Stacey does Mimi’s makeup, though Mama told Mimi not to put too much because she is beautiful enough already. Mimi’s skin is too dark for Stacey’s foundation, so Stacey puts blusher on her cheeks, Vaseline on her lips, and opens her hair. When Mimi looks in the mirror, she is afraid of being vain and thinking she could be pretty. She tells Stacey she is talented before they head downstairs. Papa takes pictures of them and Mama puts her wedding pearls around Mimi’s neck. Stacey and Mimi say “Eww” when Papa says the boys won’t have a chance with them, even though Mimi knows the boys like Stacey. Papa gives Mimi a dime just in case she needs to call. Mimi wishes Timothy were there to see her dressed up.
Part 2, Poems 72-75 Summary: “Spring Thing” to “Full Missing Moon”
In “Spring Thing,” Mimi is both excited and nervous at the dance. The music is so loud that they have to shout in each other’s ears, the walls are lined with streamers, and the lights are dimmed. Everything glitters and the air smells nice. Girls talk to each other and other boys. Stacey and Mimi start to dance, and Stacey tells her she is good. An eighth-grade boy asks Stacey to dance as the band switches to a slow dancing song. Mimi looks around, hoping someone will smile or wave to her. When no one does, she backs up to the wall and smiles at people. Though some smile back, no one interacts with her. When someone accidentally bumps her, the kids behind the refreshment table don’t notice except to line up the tipped over cans and bottles. Mimi feels like the part of the moon the crescent curls around, like an invisible shadow. She finds the dime Papa gave her and calls him.
In “Science Groove,” the students bring their projects to school. Teachers, parents, families, and everyone else will come to look at the projects and ask questions since there isn’t much to do in Hillsborough, and the judges will examine the projects tomorrow. Papa says Mimi’s project is at a good spot at the end of the table in front of the entrance. People walk past, asking Mimi questions about her project and her nationality. David, who made the water mill in wood shop, is in Group B but thinks he should be in the group that wins awards. He asks Mimi how a box with holes is better than a water mill, if her father made it, and says he would be in Group A if Mimi didn’t move to Hillsborough. Mimi finds it funny that people get to decide when she is invisible, but she can’t make them disappear. Mr. Dell arrives and tells Mimi that her box looks good and asks if she made it all by herself. In “No Words,” Mimi wonders who took the moon out of her moon box and why. Though all her words have drifted into the “loneliness of space” (186), she still cries. In “Full Missing Moon,” Mimi is allowed to stay in the Groove even though her moon is gone. She can’t show the judge the best part of her project, and he can only look through the holes and imagine how beautiful the moon looked with a flashlight shining on it from different angles. The worst part is that she is now in Group B and won’t win any prize. David’s water mill moved to her spot in Group A, and he doesn’t look at her as they wait for the results.
Part 2, Poems 76-79 Summary: “Bad Dreams” to “The End of the Beginning”
In “Bad Dreams,” Mimi thinks about bad dreams that make you glad they are only dreams. She wishes she could wake up from bad days. In “Learning Japanese,” Mimi heads over to where Karen and Kim sit in the cafeteria. She asks if they want to learn Japanese and they ask her to teach them some words. Mimi tells them the word baka and says that it is hard to translate, except that it is a sign of respect. Mimi is having fun and holds her hand over her mouth. The girls ask Mimi if you say it to teachers. Mimi says you say it to your parents too, and that her mom says it to her dad all the time. They ask Mimi to sit with them, but she stops smiling and almost tells them the truth. She taught them a word her mom would be ashamed of her knowing, and she wishes she could tell them how lonely and hurt she feels.
In “Party Snacks,” it is a week before the last day of school and Mr. Pease asks the students to sign up to bring snacks for the end of the year party. When the paper comes to Mimi, she writes sushi even though she hasn’t asked Mama. She thinks of the faces her classmates will make and their voices when they ask if she eats raw fish—even though the sushi would have cooked shrimp—and crosses out sushi to write chocolate chip cookies instead. In “The End of the Beginning,” it’s Mimi’s last day of seventh grade, and the last class is English. Mr. Pease hands back the journals. Mimi flips through the pages to find comments like “very good” and “very observant” (195). Mimi skips past pages where she said things that weren’t kind or respectful of others. The last page has an A plus, next to which Mr. Pease commented that he enjoyed reading it, knows her better, and asks her to keep writing poetry. Though Mimi is glad that it helped Mr. Pease know her, it helped her to know herself.
Part 2, Poems 63-79 Analysis
The narrator continues to use poetic elements to emphasize important themes and character development. In the four-line poem “One-Way,” Mimi asks why her friends come to her house but never invite her, emphasizing her own navigation of her identity in relation to how people treat her differently. Similarly, in the poem “Spatial Reasoning,” the guidance counselor adamantly believes that Mimi’s high score on the spatial reasoning test is a mistake simply because of societal norms and expectations of girls. The enjambment used to describe the guidance counselor’s actions during the meeting emphasizes how Mimi processes the interaction. The italicized lines separated as single-lined stanzas create a visual of Mimi’s own questions—she doesn’t understand how it could be a mistake. Her upbringing has never included such strict gender roles, and she has been exposed to things much different than the norms of Hillsborough.
Both poetic elements and metaphors work hand in hand to explore Mimi’s experiences and the novel’s developing themes. When someone steals the moon that Mimi worked so hard to make, the poem “No Words” expresses her lack of words both in its short stanzas, capitalization, enjambment, and short length. Unable to describe her emotions, the metaphor of her words drifting away into space is used to emphasize her lack of agency in the situation. The repeated metaphor of drip, drip, drip refers to the idea of drops of water eventually cracking granite. Mimi’s father teaches Mimi that slow and steady action over time is more effective than forcing immediate change, and Mimi reminds herself of this in multiple instances to stop herself from hastily pushing for too much. However, Mimi does not give in to society’s expectations—she slowly pushes against gender roles towards change. The last poem of Part 2 signals and foreshadows a climactic shift in the next part—writing poetry throughout seventh grade has not only helped Mimi’s English teacher get to know her better, but it has also helped her to work through her own identity and better understand who she is herself.
