Benchmark Evaluation II Ted Kooser and Mark Vinz show a lot of emotion in their poems, Abandoned Farmhouse and Deserted Farmhouse. Ted Kooser talks about how there was once a family that lived on a farmhouse. Money was scarce tho for the family so they had to abandon it. Mark Viz tells the poem of how there was a farmhouse that was left and sat there to collapse. By the end of the poem tho, spring is coming. Both poems show loneliness, depression, and fear. The poems both show a form of loneliness in the farmhouses. The reader can infer this because stated in the poem Deserted Farmhouse is stated “Where the barn stood / the empty milking stalls rise up / like the skeleton of an ancient sea beast, / exiled forever on shores of prairie” (Vinz lines 1-4). This shows that the Farmhouse is all alone in the fields and that no one has been there for a long time. Statede in the poem Abandon Farmhouse is “It was lonely here, says the narrow country road. / Something went wrong, says the empty house” (Kooser 7-8). This shows the reader that the setting in the poem was lonely because it is stated. Both poems show loneliness because the farmhouses have no …show more content…
The reader can infer this because stated in the poem Deserted Farmhouse is stated “Where the barn stood / the empty milking stalls rise up / like the skeleton of an ancient sea beast” (Vinz lines 1-3). This shows that the Farmhouse is showing fear because the farmhouse is now like a massive skeleton of a sea beast. The statement give an unpleasant emotion caused by the belief that someone or something is dangerous. Stated in the poem Abandon Farmhouse is “Money was scarce, say the jars of plum preserves / and canned tomatoes sealed in the cellar hole.” (Kooser 13-14). This shows the reader that the setting in the poem was fearful because a dark cellar hole with old jars just gives the reader an odd feeling different from what is usual or expected. Kinda
Both poems are set in the past, and both fathers are manual labourers, which the poets admired as a child. Both poems indicate intense change in their fathers lives, that affected the poet in a drastic way. Role reversal between father and son is evident, and a change of emotion is present. These are some of the re-occurring themes in both poems. Both poems in effect deal with the loss of a loved one; whether it be physically or mentally.
The use of phrases like ‘notice how the oldest girl…’ gives a feeling that the narrator is pointing out to the responder the family members, as if the narrator and the responder are both present at the scene when the family’s moving at the time. The blackberries were used as an indicator of time, showing us how long the family has stayed in this place for, and the changes of the blackberries from when they had first arrived to when they were leaving also used as a symbol to create mood of sadness and the lost of hope. We know from several lines of the poem that the family only stayed at the house that they’ll soon be leaving for a very short while. From the lines: ‘and she’ll go out to the vegetable patch and pick up all the green tomatoes from the vines,’ – The green tomatoes tell us that the tomato plant has not been planted long, not long enough to produce ripe fruits by the time they’re going to leave. ‘
Both authors use figurative language to help develop sensory details. In the poem It states, “And I sunned it with my smiles, And with soft deceitful wiles.” As the author explains how the character is feeling, the reader can create a specific image in there head based on the details that is given throughout the poem. Specifically this piece of evidence shows the narrator growing more angry and having more rage. In the short story ” it states, “We are below the river's bed. The drops of moisture trickle among bones.” From this piece of text evidence the reader can sense the cold dark emotion that is trying to be formed. Also this excerpt shows the conflict that is about to become and the revenge that is about to take place. By the story and the poem using sensory details, they both share many comparisons.
As he slouches in bed, a description of the bare trees and an old woman gathering coal are given to convey to the reader an idea of the times and the author's situation. "All groves are bare," and "unmarried women (are) sorting slate from arthracite." This image operates to tell the reader that it is a time of poverty, or a "yellow-bearded winter of depression." No one in the town has much to live for during this time. "Cold trees" along with deadness, through the image of "graves," help illustrate the author's impression of winter. Wright seems to be hibernating from this hard time of winter, "dreaming of green butterflies searching for diamonds in coal seams." This conveys a more colorful and happy image showing what he wishes was happening; however he knows that diamonds are not in coal seams and is brought back to the reality of winter. He talks of "hills of fresh graves" while dreaming, relating back to the reality of what is "beyond the streaked trees of (his) window," a dreary, povern-strucken, and cold winter.
...ome the dream of attainment slowly became a nightmare. His house has been abandoned, it is empty and dark, the entryway or doors are locked. The sign of age, rust comes off in his hands. His body is cold, and he has deteriorated physically & emotionally. He is weathered just like his house and life. He is damaged poor, homeless, and the abandoned one.
...r supper...He shouted, pounded on the door, tried to force it with his shoulder, and then, looking in the windows, saw the place was empty.”(257) Needy’s journey ended at a dark, lonely place; it was then he realized that he had no one left. Needy’s empty house was symbolic of the emptiness he now had in his heart.
The first similarity is that elderly people are left out of the society. In the novel, the elderly cannot have a family. They live in the House of the Old because they are separated from the society. All the people are getting older and weaker without exception, so it is hard for them to live without family. Nonetheless, the society isolates the elderly. “The Old were sitting quietly, some visiting and talking with one another, others doing handwork and simple crafts. A few were asleep” (p. 28). Likewise, in the modern society, elderly people are lonely. Some avoid taking care of their parents suffering from disease like Alzheimer. The elderly are apt to be easily depressed, and this depression can be triggered by the deaths of their spouses, relatives, and friends or by financial worries. Therefore, old people need constant care and their family’s affection. However, due to hectic lifestyle of current society, many elderly people live alone or in care center without their family.
Through the lonely speaker, a detached tone is expressed with the use of selective diction, deep symbolism, and reflective allusion working together to form the meaning of the poem that hardships bring us to detachment from life because it causes us to feel isolated from others.
The first word is almanac. “…the old grandmother sits in the kitchen with the child…reading jokes from the almanac, laughing and talking to hide her tears” (923). It was a distraction to what it actually symbolized; passing time. The almanac tells her, “I know what I know” (924). The power of the almanac is suggested here; it does not only predict weather change-“the rain that beats on the roof of the house” (923), but it also foretells the emotions she would be feeling-“her equinoctial tears”. The almanac eventually tells her it is “time to plant tears”, which is a way of the grandmother knowing she is permitted to let go and move forward. Next is stove. The plot of the story revolves in the kitchen where the stove is placed. She feels at ease in her kitchen and seems to spend most of her time there. She “puts more wood in the stove” (924) when she feels chilly. The feeling of being cold can be associated with death. The stove gives her comfort that the feeling will pass. Last is house. The house resembles the grandmother. The first two lines referring to the house show the external portion. “September rain falls on the house” (923). “…and the rain that beats on the roof of the house” (923). This shows that on the outside, the grandmother is worn out and beaten down because of this loss she is experiencing. We
The story begins as the boy describes his neighborhood. Immediately feelings of isolation and hopelessness begin to set in. The street that the boy lives on is a dead end, right from the beginning he is trapped. In addition, he feels ignored by the houses on his street. Their brown imperturbable faces make him feel excluded from the decent lives within them. The street becomes a representation of the boy’s self, uninhabited and detached, with the houses personified, and arguably more alive than the residents (Gray). Every detail of his neighborhood seems designed to inflict him with the feeling of isolation. The boy's house, like the street he lives on, is filled with decay. It is suffocating and “musty from being long enclosed.” It is difficult for him to establish any sort of connection to it. Even the history of the house feels unkind. The house's previous tenant, a priest, had died while living there. He “left all his money to institutions and the furniture of the house to his sister (Norton Anthology 2236).” It was as if he was trying to insure the boy's boredom and solitude. The only thing of interest that the boy can find is a bicycle pump, which is rusty and rendered unfit to play with. Even the “wild” garden is gloomy and desolate, containing but a lone apple tree and a few straggling bushes. It is hardly the sort of yard that a young boy would want. Like most boys, he has no voice in choosing where he lives, yet his surroundings have a powerful effect on him.
The Wife?s Lament speaks movingly about loneliness, due to the speaker projecting the lonesomeness of the women who was exiled from society. The woman in the poem has been exiled from her husband and everything she loves, all she has is a single oak-tree to be comforted by. As she has been banished from all she loves, the tone becomes gloomy and depressing. The speaker uses expressions such as joyless and dark to create a sorrowful mood for the poem. As well as the expressions used in this poem, the setting also creates loneliness. The setting generates a darkened and desolate place which makes the woman feel exiled from society.
The theme in both the poem and the passage is to not be selfish. Both contain similar events that follow this theme in a slightly different way.
The concepts of self and reality are running themes in recent eras of poetry, and these themes are all too often associated with ideas of meaninglessness. In Larry Levis’s, “Some Grass Along a Ditch Bank” (1985), the writer brings in these different themes as the narrator contemplates grass around a farm and its relationship with the world around it. The poem is set in the farm setting that is so common in the works of Levis, and the ideas he explores about grass can easily be transferred to, or symbolic of, the ideas that the poet may have shared concerning relationships between people. Despite these connections and the deeper meaning of the poem, however, critics read this and other poems as having primarily nihilistic themes. This and other of his poems have been read as being, “bravely and madly about all-living-and-all-dying” (Halliday 92). Death and life are themes in Levis’s poem and do appear in this one, but nihilism requires that the artist also explores a general lack of meaning. Instead, reading this particular poem while considering its relation to the self and relationships, demonstrates that Levis’s focus is more on the general concept of the isolate, meaning that he writes about the lack of the individual’s ability to come to establish understanding between people, rather than a complete lack of meaning in life.
Similarly, the furniture in the house is as sullen as the house itself. What little furniture is in the house is beaten-up; this is a symbol of the dark setting. The oak bed is the most important p...
In verse 1 when it say’s ( I know you're somewhere out there ). It makes me think of my Great Grandpa Cowling. He’s somewhere out there but just not in this world. When you look at verse 2 it say’s ( talking to the moon ) Since i am the only girl out of 7 kids on my dad's side of the family, I got up to my room and start talking to myself.