Class 12 English · Original EZT practice
Keeping Quiet - Pablo Neruda (Class 12 English, Flamingo, Poem 2)
Keeping Quiet is Poem 2 in the Poetry section of Class 12 Flamingo (Reprint 2026-27, pp. 90-92), Pablo Neruda's call for one shared second of stillness: 'Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still.' In that 'exotic moment without rush, without engines', fishermen 'would not harm whales' and the man gathering salt 'would look at his hurt hands', while makers of 'green wars' would 'walk about with their brothers in the shade, doing nothing'. Neruda insists this is not 'total inactivity' - 'Life is what it is about; I want no truck with death.' This page gives the poem's movement, images, theme and fresh practice questions. (Note: this is original practice, not a textbook exercise key.)
6 original worked examples, 6 fresh self-check questions and 4 mixed questions, with explained answers. These are not copied textbook exercises, an official chapter index or a full answer key. No affiliation with NCERT is claimed.
Official sources for topic and edition context, checked 25 October 2026:
1. The poem's movement
The call: 'Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still' - for once 'let's not speak in any language, let's stop for one second, and not move our arms so much'. The vision: 'It would be an exotic moment without rush, without engines, we would all be together in a sudden strangeness.' The small scenes: 'Fishermen in the cold sea would not harm whales and the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands.' The big scene: 'Those who prepare green wars, wars with gas, wars with fire, victory with no survivors, would put on clean clothes and walk about with their brothers in the shade, doing nothing.' The clarification: 'What I want should not be confused with total inactivity. Life is what it is about; I want no truck with death.' The diagnosis: 'If we were not so single-minded about keeping our lives moving, and for once could do nothing, perhaps a huge silence might interrupt this sadness of never understanding ourselves and of threatening ourselves with death.' The lesson and the exit: 'Perhaps the Earth can teach us as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive. Now I'll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go.'
2. Images and ideas
'count to twelve... keep still': a shared, countable pause - small enough for everyone to join. 'not speak in any language': silence as the one tongue every human shares. 'Fishermen... would not harm whales': stillness turns hunters into witnesses; nature gets a reprieve. 'the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands': in pause, the labourer finally sees the cost of his labour. 'green wars... victory with no survivors': wars dressed as triumphs that nobody survives to celebrate. 'the Earth can teach us': seeds under winter ground - 'everything seems dead and later proves to be alive' - stillness is not death.
3. Theme and word meanings
Quiet introspection: the pause is for self-knowledge - 'this sadness of never understanding ourselves'. Mutual understanding among human beings: 'we would all be together in a sudden strangeness' - brotherhood without engines or arms. Life, not inactivity: 'Life is what it is about' - the stillness serves life, which is why the poet wants 'no truck with death'. Word meanings (textbook-flagged expressions, explained): to have no truck with - to refuse to associate or deal with, to refuse to tolerate something (textbook gloss); exotic moment - an unusual, striking moment; sudden strangeness - an unexpected feeling of togetherness in stillness; single-minded - focused on one thing only, here on 'keeping our lives moving'; huge silence - the deep collective quiet the poet imagines.
Choose, solve, check, then try a fresh question.
Before calculating, read the method prompt and name the condition that makes it useful. Write your own attempt. Open the steps only when you need them, and use the check to catch a wrong sign, unit or interpretation. Finish with the fresh question before reading its answer.
Fix the one-second request
Choose the method: Three refusals in a row.
EZT practice question
What does the poet ask everyone to do for 'one second'?
Show the worked solution
- The frame: 'Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still.'
- The three refusals: 'let's not speak in any language, let's stop for one second, and not move our arms so much.'
- No language, no movement - the pause is total but tiny: one second.
Answer: Stop, 'not speak in any language', and 'not move our arms so much' - counting to twelve and keeping still.
Check: The count to twelve, the no-language and no-arm-movement refusals, the one-second span.
Watch for this: Do not stretch the pause into a day of silence - the poet asks for one second; its smallness is what makes it possible for everyone.
Now try it yourself
Why twelve, and not ten or a hundred?
Check your answer
The poem gives no reason - twelve is simply the shared countable limit, like the hours on a clock everyone can follow.
A pause everyone can count is a pause everyone can join.
Read the two small scenes
Choose the method: A hunter and a labourer, paused.
EZT practice question
What would the fishermen and the man gathering salt do in that still moment?
Show the worked solution
- The fishermen: 'Fishermen in the cold sea would not harm whales' - hunting stops.
- The salt-gatherer: 'the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands' - the labourer finally sees the cost of his labour.
- Both scenes need no speech: stillness itself does the teaching.
Answer: 'Fishermen in the cold sea would not harm whales and the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands'.
Check: The unharmed whales and the examined hurt hands.
Watch for this: Do not read the fishermen scene as environmental policy - it shows what simply stopping does, not a programme.
Now try it yourself
What does the salt-gatherer's glance at his hands teach?
Check your answer
In pause, the worker finally sees what his work costs him - hurt that constant motion hides.
Stillness turns doing into seeing.
Face the big scene
Choose the method: War-makers in clean clothes.
EZT practice question
Who does the poet picture putting on clean clothes, and what would they do instead of fighting?
Show the worked solution
- The people: 'Those who prepare green wars, wars with gas, wars with fire, victory with no survivors'.
- The change: they 'would put on clean clothes'.
- The replacement act: 'walk about with their brothers in the shade, doing nothing'.
Answer: 'Those who prepare green wars, wars with gas, wars with fire, victory with no survivors' - they would 'walk about with their brothers in the shade, doing nothing'.
Check: The green-wars makers, the clean clothes, the brothers-in-the-shade walk.
Watch for this: Do not soften 'victory with no survivors' - the poet's point is that such a victory is no victory at all.
Now try it yourself
What makes the shade walk the opposite of a war?
Check your answer
Enemies become 'brothers', and action becomes 'doing nothing' together - brotherhood without engines or arms.
The stillness imagines the war instinct switched off, not won.
Hear the clarification
Choose the method: Life, not death.
EZT practice question
What does the poet declare his wish should NOT be confused with?
Show the worked solution
- The warning: 'What I want should not be confused with total inactivity.'
- The reason: 'Life is what it is about.'
- The refusal: 'I want no truck with death' - the textbook glosses 'to have no truck with' as refusing to associate with or tolerate.
Answer: 'Total inactivity' - 'Life is what it is about; I want no truck with death.'
Check: The not-total-inactivity warning, the life aim, and the no-truck-with-death refusal.
Watch for this: Do not read the poem as asking people to stop living or working - the pause serves life; that is the whole clarification.
Now try it yourself
Why does the poet need this clarification at all?
Check your answer
Because a call for universal stillness sounds like a call for shutdown or death - he separates quiet introspection from both.
The poem's pause is a means to life, never its opposite.
Picture the exotic moment
Choose the method: Together in sudden strangeness.
EZT practice question
What kind of moment does the poet imagine, and what would be missing from it?
Show the worked solution
- The moment: 'an exotic moment' - unusual, striking.
- The missing things: 'without rush, without engines'.
- The togetherness: 'we would all be together in a sudden strangeness'.
Answer: 'An exotic moment without rush, without engines', when 'we would all be together in a sudden strangeness'.
Check: The exotic label, the missing rush and engines, the sudden-strangeness togetherness.
Watch for this: Do not treat 'exotic' as foreign or faraway - here it means strikingly unusual, because shared stillness never happens.
Now try it yourself
What usually keeps us from this moment, in the poem's diagnosis?
Check your answer
Being 'so single-minded about keeping our lives moving' - motion as the habit that blocks self-understanding.
The enemy is not noise but unbroken motion.
Carry the Earth's lesson out
Choose the method: Seeds, then the exit.
EZT practice question
How does the poem end?
Show the worked solution
- The lesson: 'Perhaps the Earth can teach us as when everything seems dead and later proves to be alive.'
- Seeds under winter ground look dead and are not - stillness is not death.
- The exit: 'Now I'll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go' - the poet leaves first, having led the count.
Answer: 'Now I'll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go' - the poet leaves first, having led the count, after the Earth's lesson that what 'seems dead... later proves to be alive'.
Check: The Earth's lesson and the poet's own departure.
Watch for this: Do not miss that the poet exits - he asks for one second, keeps it, and goes; the stillness is not permanent residence.
Now try it yourself
Why is the Earth's lesson the right proof for this poem?
Check your answer
Because winter seeds prove that looking dead is not being dead - so a still humanity is not a finished one.
Nature's pause is the model for the human one.
Try a mixed set
Choose a method or explanation before opening each answer.
1. The shared request?
Show answer and reason
'Now we will count to twelve and we will all keep still.'
A pause small enough for everyone to join.
2. The fishermen and the salt-gatherer?
Show answer and reason
'Fishermen in the cold sea would not harm whales and the man gathering salt would look at his hurt hands.'
Stillness turns hunters into witnesses and lets the labourer see his cost.
3. Not to be confused with?
Show answer and reason
'Total inactivity' - 'Life is what it is about; I want no truck with death.'
The stillness serves life, not shutdown.
4. The exit?
Show answer and reason
'Now I'll count up to twelve and you keep quiet and I will go.'
The poet keeps the second he asked for, and leaves.
Try it yourself
Work these on paper before checking any notes. Answers are deliberately not shown here.
- In two sentences, explain how the fishermen and salt-gatherer scenes show what stillness does.
- Contrast 'green wars... victory with no survivors' with the walk 'with their brothers in the shade', quoting one phrase from each.
- Explain in your own words why the poet says 'I want no truck with death' in a poem about stopping.
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Questions about this practice page
- Who wrote Keeping Quiet?
- Pablo Neruda (1904-1973) - the pen name of Neftali Ricardo Reyes Basoalto, born in Parral, Chile; he won the Nobel Prize for Literature in 1971, and his poems use easily understood images.
- What is Keeping Quiet about?
- A shared second of stillness for all humanity - no language, no engines, no arm-movement - so that people can feel together, see their own hurt, and choose life over 'victory with no survivors'.
- What does 'I want no truck with death' mean in Keeping Quiet?
- The poet refuses to deal with death (the textbook glosses 'to have no truck with' as refusing to associate with or tolerate something): his call for stillness serves life, not inactivity or death.
- Is Keeping Quiet a rhyming poem?
- It is free verse - the textbook asks you to notice 'the differing line lengths of the stanzas and the shift in thought from stanza to stanza' rather than a rhyme scheme.
- Where is Keeping Quiet in the Class 12 book?
- Poem 2 in the Poetry section of the Flamingo core-course textbook (Reprint 2026-27, pp. 90-92), by Pablo Neruda.