The poem “How I Discovered Poetry” by Marilyn Nelson presents the theme of finding an interest or passion for something. Also another theme that can be wrapped around this poem is the power of words. The speaker is Nelson who is in the classroom while her teacher, Mrs. Purdy is reading from her desk. Mrs. Purdy becomes one of the main influence of her finding her passion for poetry. Mrs. Purdy seems to be a very genuine and loving teacher who cares about her students. This is shown when she brings in a poem specifically for the speaker and asks the speaker to read it in front of her classmates. The speaker also seemed to be different than her classmates in a way where she is more attentive and studious than them. This is portrayed when the…
So we ask ourselves, how does poetry gain its power? To answer this question, we examine the work of poets Harwood and Plath. ‘The Glass Jar’, composed by Gwen Harwood portrays its message through the emotions of a young child, while the poem ‘Ariel’, written by Sylvia Plath, makes effective use of emotions to convey artistic creativity and inspiration.…
Sometimes we can just let poetry wash over us as we float in the words, the ebb and flow of the meter and the rhyme syncing with our heartbeat. But other times, we get stuck. We wonder. Then we ... check out, right? It's just too hard. I mean, really, when you get lost, you get out your GPS on your phone. What's all this about stars and astrolabes and barks? But wait -- I know you better than that. You are a natural researcher, a student who never lost touch with your inner child-scientist who wanted to know why the grass was green and who now wants to know what love is.…
Just as poetry is a permanent mark of feelings that last forever on paper, tattoos are permanent symbols that last forever on the skin. Tattoos and poetry can easily be combined such as in Kim Addonizio’s sonnet, “First Poem for You,” the speaker admires her partner’s nature themed tattoos in a darkened room. This may seem to be a simple poem, but by utilizing tattoos as symbols, including tactile and visual imagery in her poem, and using the sonnet as her structure, Addonizio laments about the true meaning of relationships and their longevity.…
"Compressed emotions," that is the explanation a teacher once gave to the ongoing question, "What is poetry?" He said it was someone's deepest emotions, as if you were reading them right out of that person's mind, which in that case would not consist of any words at all. If someone tells you a story, it is usually like a shell. Rarely are all of the deepest and most personal emotions revealed effectively. A poem of that story would be like the inside of the shell. It personifies situations, and symbolizes and compares emotions with other things in life. Louise Erdrich's poem Indian Boarding School puts the emotions of a person or group of people in a setting around a railroad track. The feelings experienced are compared to things from the setting,…
“Still I Rise” is a type of poem called a lyric poem. Most lyric poetry expresses raw emotion and is commonly spoken in third person. Throughout the poem, the same phrase ‘I rise’ is repeated ten times. The simile “Still, like dust, I rise,” creates imagery, helping the reader to picture the rising cloud of dust in his or her mind. Angelou uses a metaphor as she compares…
The poems transition from an absolute experience to the abstract is mirrored by the tone, beginning wistful and moving toward resignation. Harwood utilizes imagery of imprisonment and personification of the heart “when the heart mourns in its prison” to establish a confrontation between the heart and the spirit. The line “In the space between love and sleep” is repeated and inverted in the third stanza “darkness between sleep and love”; foregrounding the struggle between sensuality and spirituality (QUESTION).…
Maya Angelou’s style is very intriguing and captivating due to her usage of tone. Maya Angelou was an American Civil Rights Activist, born in St Louis, Missouri, who lived through the Jim Crow Era - which, as mentioned before, was a critical period in terms of the rise of racial segregation in the United States. Unlike the majority of her kind, Angelou was extremely privileged - becoming a successful actress, author and poet. Although she is privileged and considerably well-off in her own personal endeavors, she is fully aware of the atrocity and inhumanity with which her fellow folk are being treated with on a daily basis. In the poem, she decants and expresses her frustration, but she does so with great subtlety and restraint. Although she uses a confrontational tone (by using the pronoun ‘you’) towards white people (which is the intended audience of the poem), she does not personally attack them in any way. She simply poses rhetorical questions which make the audience re-evaluate their way of thinking and cause them to truly see that their beliefs are founded upon hatred and false accusations. Aside from using a confrontational tone, Angelou also makes use of a perseverant tone which, through close analysis, entails a valuable message for people from all walks of life and, more importantly, the black folk who suffer from racial discrimination. “...I rise..”…
In the book, Night, Elie Wiesel tells about the horrors of being held captive in a Nazi concentration camp and a death camp during World War II. Elie Wiesel was a Jewish boy who grew up in Sighet, Romania but his childhood was interrupted by the Nazi’s. The Holocaust affected Elie’s beliefs, his relationship with his family, his view of the world, his purpose, and his loves. The purpose of this paper is to examine the elements of Elie’s love before the Holocaust, in the beginning of Auschwitz, and in chapter five at Buna. After reading Elie Wiesel’s memoir, Night, the reader traces Elie’s life through his experiences in the Holocaust. By examining what the love, it is clear that he changes from a religious, sensitive little boy to a spiritually dead, unemotional man.…
In reading a poem or a novel always the literature has a magnificent impact on the body, mind or imagination. A great literature or introduction of words can stir the reader body, mind and even imagination of the story behind it. In this essay, I will explore how can poems literature stirs the body, mind, and imagination and this will present through two poems ‘ The Weary Blues’ by Langston Hughes and ‘The Tin Wash Dish’ by Les A. Murray. In the Hughes poem the literature stirs the body in slow motion, stirs the mind in that musician have a great night and that have the same effect on the reader. Imagine the musician enjoying the piano music. However, in the Murray poem the literature stirs the body to feel sadness, the mind of the hardship of the poverty and imagination of…
A verbal, artistic, literary work called ‘poetry’ is designed to give intensity, beauty and the portrayal of feelings within a poet’s initial idea. It is a suggested beauty designed to create passion through experiences, ideas, and emotions in a vivid and imaginative way. ‘Gwen Harwood’ uses poetry to pronounce her personal experiences, expressing them through themes such as; Life and death, Making the ordinary extraordinary and Relationships. Sound and rhythmic language choices are used to evoke an emotional response from the audience conveying memorable ideas that become apparent within the verbal composition. Techniques demonstrate and signify the poet’s philosophies of her time, through the expressional texts ‘At Mornington’, ‘Mother who gave me life’, and ‘Triste, Triste’. Harwood attracts critics and a vast range of audiences that interpret her intense, visionary interpretation of the subject at heart.…
The poem “The Poet at Seven” by Donald Justice uses many literary elements, including tone, to convey the idea about the joys of writing poetry throughout the poem. The speaker reveals that many common childhood experiences correspond to the purposes of writing poetry which he feels are important.…
Construct a close reading of this poem that demonstrates your awareness of the poet’s body of work.…
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“Bishop’s carefully judged use of language aids the reader to uncover the intensity of feeling in her poetry.”…