Hawk Roosting Aniela Baseley 13 FO The poem is written by poet Ted Hughes. In his life time Hughes has published many poems about nature and animals.
The poem is written by poet Ted Hughes. In his life time Hughes has published many poems about nature and animals.
The poem has six stanzas, all written in the first person, with no discernable rhyming scheme. The poem represents a hawk, as it roosts on a tree top, watching over the world and contemplating life. This hawk sees itself, as the centre of the world and the best of creation. He believes he controls the world, bringing death to anything below him that dares to question his authority. The poem shows the reader that nature isn’t always beautiful, and the hawk is a metaphor of humans, because humans dominate the world, as does this hawk. The poem is written with a chilling attitude to power.
In the first stanza, the hawk is perched on top of a tree, awaiting nightfall. We know this because the hawk is ‘Roosting.’ His arrogance is already clear, “ Inaction, no falsifying dream” this indicates to the reader, that even when the hawk is sleeping, he does not dream ‘needless’ dreams. The hawk just has focus on killing. Alliteration is then used “hooked head,” this extenuates the line with a sound, as well as the hawks egoism and obsession with itself. “ I sit on top of the wood, my eyes closed,” conveys
a sense of forceful peace, as if the hawk holds so much power that it is fearless, and
can roost confidently without being hunted.
The second stanza also shows the hawks great egoism, as he believes everything is created for him. The high trees, which he roosts on, are convenient to give him a good view of the world. The air allows him to float while searching, and the sun allows him to lock on to the prey, the earth is facing upwards for his inspection. The attitude here makes the hawk appear to be royal or God like. For example, he is like a king inspecting his subjects; the rodents he hunts have no other purpose but to serve him a feed. He rules as a dictator, by force.
The hawk in the third stanza sees himself as the centre of creation, “It took the whole of creation, to produce my foot, my each feather.” At the same time, he is saying that he rules creation with his foot.
In the narrative poem “Cautionary Tale of Girls and Birds of Prey” the author, Sandy Longhorn, tells the story of a young girl who is afraid of a hawk, and her inconsiderate father who doesn’t take her concerns seriously. The story shows how her father is determined to get rid of her fear of the hawk, because he thinks it is both foolish and childish. The daughter very well knows the capability of the hawk, however her father doesn’t acknowledge it until it is too late. In the poem, Longhorn uses alliteration and rhyme to help explore the theme of how being inconsiderate towards others can in the end hurt you as much as it hurts them. The poem takes place on a little farm where the girl and her father live with all of their livestock.
The poem starts with the speaker saying, “The American eagle is not aware he is; the American eagle” (Stanza 1), to show that the eagle is confident with who he is. The speaker then goes on to say, “… He is never tempted to look modest” (1), to support the idea of the eagle
While the man is thinking about the wolf and the impact it had on its surroundings, he knows that many people would be afraid of the it. Realizing that something can be both “terrible and of great beauty,” the man's sense of awe is heightened. While laying under the moonlight, the man thinks about the wolf both figuratively and literally running through the dew on the grass and how there would be a “rich matrix of creatures [that had] passed in the night before her.” Figuratively, this represents the wolf running into heaven. However, the man imagining the wolf literally running and the beauty of her free movements across the “grassy swale” creates a sense of awe that he has for the wolf. A wolf running towards someone would be terrifying, but a wolf running with freedom is magnificently beautiful. After imagining this, the man knows that even though wolves can be terrifying, “the world cannot lose” their sense of beauty and
The tile of the poem “Bird” is simple and leads the reader smoothly into the body of the poem, which is contained in a single stanza of twenty lines. Laux immediately begins to describe a red-breasted bird trying to break into her home. She writes, “She tests a low branch, violet blossoms/swaying beside her” and it is interesting to note that Laux refers to the bird as being female (Laux 212). This is the first clue that the bird is a symbol for someone, or a group of people (women). The use of a bird in poetry often signifies freedom, and Laux’s use of the female bird implies female freedom and independence. She follows with an interesting image of the bird’s “beak and breast/held back, claws raking at the pan” and this conjures a mental picture of a bird who is flying not head first into a window, but almost holding herself back even as she flies forward (Laux 212). This makes the bird seem stubborn, and follows with the theme of the independent female.
This gives the effect that although there is mass devastation, there is always a light at the end of the tunnel, in this case for the eagle, the leftover remains of a carcass. However, as seen throughout the poem this isn’t the case for everyone and everything as the dead or dying clearly outnumber those prospering from the drought. This further adds to the miserable and discouraging mood of the poem. Other poetic devices are also used during the course of the
Moore begins the last stanza with an ambiguous “So”. Although one has a heightened awareness of mortality, one “behaves,” one keeps the ego disciplined. This is the same concept as that of the caged bird who, though held captive in a cruelly small space, continues to sing with all his heart. Despite the bird's lack of “satisfaction” because of his loss of flight and freedom, he knows “joy”.
As a way to end his last stanza, the speaker creates an image that surpasses his experiences. When the flock rises, the speaker identifies it as a lady’s gray silk scarf, which the woman has at first chosen, then rejected. As the woman carelessly tosses the scarf toward the chair the casual billow fades from view, like the birds. The last image connects nature with a last object in the poet's
The diction surrounding this alteration enhances the change in attitude from self-loath to outer-disgust, such as in lines 8 through 13, which read, “The sky/ was dramatic with great straggling V’s/ of geese streaming south, mare’s tails above them./ Their trumpeting made us look up and around./ The course sloped into salt marshes,/ and this seemed to cause the abundance of birds.” No longer does he use nature as symbolism of himself; instead he spills blame upon it and deters it from himself. The diction in the lines detailing the new birds he witnesses places nature once more outside of his correlation, as lines 14 through 18 read, “As if out of the Bible/ or science fiction,/ a cloud appeared, a cloud of dots/ like iron filings, which a magnet/ underneath the paper
Initially, the poem appears to be about an observer forming a connection with a blackbird that he encounters many times. Then the reader realizes that the poem is by Stevens and something else must be going on- and they are correct. In order to see the entire picture, it is very important to look at the bits and pieces that create it. The meaning of each individual part, the setting, the usage of literary devices such as distinct symbolism, and versatile thematic messages are all very important in creating a clear understanding. The path has been laid out, now it is time to shred this work into pieces!
The birds show symbolism in more than one way throughout the text. As the soldiers are travelling from all over the world to fight for their countries in the war, the birds are similarly migrating for the change of seasons. The birds however, will all be returning, and many of the soldiers will never return home again. This is a very powerful message, which helps the reader to understand the loss and sorrow that is experienced through war.
The Hawk’s fascist connotations are apparent throughout the play. The bird ends his monologue by stating, ‘I am going to keep things like this’. This line can be separated into two parts; the first section, ‘I am going to’ implies his intentions not to permit change. These points to the fact that he has ultimate control of his fate, his future is assured; unlike Macbeth whose fate is on the hands of others. This is followed by the words, ‘keep things like this’, which connotes that his authority and his position on top of the food chain is infallible and will remain until his death. This parallels fascist regimes where the dictator has ultimate power over his subjects and nothing can disrupt his control. The Hawk’s control over his own future is described in a way that connotes a fascist regime.
The poet mourns the death of his loved one and wants the world to grieve with him. His wants his subjective to be objective. The first stanza links everything to noise. He wants to 'silence the piano ' for example, showing how he wants no more noise in the world. Throughout the poem, there are many imperatives. This relates back to Remember, where the poems title is included in the imperatives. The third stanza has no imperatives at all, and many antonyms. This is the poets way of saying they meant everything to him. The second stanza uses 'scribbling ' to personify a plane. The use of personification in the poem links back to Do not go gentle into that good night. The first stanza contains references to things that can be easily done like 'stop all the clocks '. The second has things that are theoretically possible but a bit harder to do. The poem seems to get less and less realistic as it goes on. The final line, 'For nothing now can ever come to any good ', is quite bleak, showing how the death of his partner has affected the poet. It gives him no good feelings
This takes a huge turn when it hits the sixth stanza “You'd think I never had felt before the weight of an ax-head poised aloft, the grip on earth of outspread feet. the life of muscles rocking soft and smooth and moist in vernal heat.” After a while of chopping this wood the speaker has a realization of how much this job actually matters. The poem goes on to talk about these men of the woods that want to take the job of chopping wood away from the speaker because they have a need for it, but the speaker has a love for it.
bird as the metaphor of the poem to get the message of the poem across
... the reader understand the meaning that is behind it, like so “the poem concludes by asking rhetorically whether its listeners now understand the truths produced by both birds and poetry” (SparkNotes Editors). Besides nature being compared from birds a deeper meaning is behind this symbol and this is “art produces soothing, truthful sounds” (SparkNotes Editors) just like the soothing sounds from a bird that anyone can enjoy.