My daughter has a homework assignment on metaphors.   The excercise ask her to cirlce the two things being compared in the following metaphors.  What two things would you circle?

1. His tail was wagging so fast it was just a yellow blur.

2. There was a little brush of yellow tail whiping back and forth.

3. Its tongue hung out underneath a little wet raisin of a nose.

Hello Lance

A metaphor is an implicit statement of some point of resemblance between two things that differ in other respects. But a fast-wagging tail isn't like a blur: it is a blur. So I wouldn't call #1 an example of metaphor.

In #2, "brush" is another word for "a fox's tail", so that too is not particularly metaphorical. "Whipping" is a little more figurative; though a "brush of a tail" probably wouldn't "whip" very effectively. A long thin tail would do the job better.

#3 on the other hand does seem to have a genuine metaphor...

MrP

< A blur is a representation of something. >

A blur can be a representation of something – for instance, a blur of pink can be a representation of a distant face, in a painting.

And when we say: "Last week is a complete blur!", we're using the word metaphorically.

But when we say that the nebula M42 in Orion is a "blur", or that a speeding train is a "blur", the sense is neither representational nor figurative. The word denotes a real optical phenomenon: if the speeding train slows down, it is no longer a "blur".

The wagging tail falls into the latter category: the "blur" denotes a real optical effect.

As for "brush": it's the word for a fox's tail.

When a hunter cuts the brush off a dead fox, there's no hint of a metaphor.

MrP