How Does Louise Gluck Use Gangsta Rap Poetry

Bao Tran

Prof. Arroyo

ENG-1102

22 September 2015

Essay 1 Poetry and rap songs are created to tell a story, to describe one’s feeling, and to express oneself. Poetry and gangsta rap songs have some in commons and contrast. In this essay, I would like to talk about the commons, and how they both applied literary terms in “My Mind Playin’ Tricks On Me” and “Gretel in Darkness.” Poets and lyricists use literary devices in their poetry and songs, and I would like to talk about alliteration, enjambment, and onomatopoeia. I also want to discuss about one out of the five categories, fatalism, in gangsta rap song and how it relates to “Gretel in Darkness.” “This is the world we wanted/…/we are there still and it is real, real. / that

One of Louise Gluck’s examples is: “Am I alone? Spies/ Hiss in the stillness, Hansel,” (lines 16-17). The author used onomatopoeia to create a sound, an emotion of Gretel frightened, and an image that gives a picture of Gretel is alone. “Hiss” is a word that imitates the sound of a snake hissing in the silence, “stillness”. In “My Mind Playin’s Tricks on Me”, “So I swung and hit the nigga in his mouth” (Ghetto Boys line 8). In this example, “swung” is a verb, but it also makes a sound of the speaker is hitting the antagonist. “What I saw will make your ass giggling” ( Ghetto Boys line 15), instead of saying “laughing”, the speaker used “giggling” to describe that he would amuse the folks to make them giggle in a ruthless

Fatalism is a term that describe cruel, murderous and survival experiences. Gluck’s poem talks about Gretel and Hansel trying to escape from the witch without getting eaten, and Gretel killed the witch by pushing her into the flame, “But I killed for you. I see armed firs/The spires of that gleaming kiln” (line 17-18). The Ghetto Boys also wrote a similar line: “But fuck that shit, there’s a nigga trying to kill me.” (line 16). The speaker is having an anxiety that somebody is trying to kill him. He wants to forget about everything else because someone is out there trying to take his life