Matthew covers many interesting topics in his poem seem to share the common cause of searching for one’s identity. Whether it be reflecting nature like his poem “Summit” or going through a huge physical and psychological change as in “Snow 2”. Matthew has a talent for using both visual and tactile imagery in his poems. He uses surprising imagery and interesting metaphor which can especially be seen in “Desert Snow Globe”. Through these strong images and metaphor, Matthew easily avoids clichés in his writing. In his revisions, I would suggest watching the amount of conjunctions used, like “and” which at times are unnecessary and a bit distracting from the imagery in the poem. Matthew’s line breaks are successful in his poems, however, I feel playing with stanzas to add a bit more structure to some of his poems could be beneficial and perhaps help the reader to break down the poem a bit easier when reading.
The strongest poem in Matthew’s packet I felt was “Snow 2”. The occasion of the poem is transformation, though the type of transformation is up to the reader. The poem describes the gradual transformation of the first person speaker into a type of creature. The first couple times I read through the poem, I took the transformation to be literal, almost cliché, in the way it described a werewolf/ vampiric transformation. However, upon reading through the poem again, because the first person narrator goes through the transformation due to the actions of another, I felt the transformation could be metaphor as well. The use of a physically unreal and impossible transformation to describe an emotional/ psychological transformation. When we are around an individual for a long time, sometimes we tend to pick up some of their mannerisms,...
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...f my poetry. Again, in his revisions, I would suggest watching the amount of conjunctions used, like “and” which at times are unnecessary and a bit distracting from the imagery in the poem. Matthew’s line breaks are successful in his poems, however, I feel playing with stanzas to add a bit more structure to some of his poems could be beneficial and perhaps help the reader to break down the poem a bit easier when reading. I feel Matthew could benefit from looking at how Rosa Alcala uses line breaks in her work, especially, in “Metropolis” and “Patria”. I also think Matthew might consider looking at CA Conrad’s poems like “Signal and Sway” as well as “An exorcism for the hell of it” to add maybe more or a free style use of stanza and line breaks in his poetry. Overall, I really enjoyed his portfolio and look forward to hopefully reading some of his work in the future!
A good example would be when the mother in the story talks about her life using a metaphor of a staircase. In the beginning of the poem, the mother says, "Well, son, I’ll tell you: Life for me ain’t been no crystal stair. It’s had tacks in it, And splinters, [...] But all the time, I’se been a-climbin’ on" (Hughes lines 1-9). This metaphor describes the mother's life experience, the reader can infer was hard, but the nice part of this excerpt is the final lines, where the metaphor of continuing to climb on the staircase is used to symbolize the mother's goal to persevere, no matter how tough life gets because she believes her efforts will accomplish something good.
First of alll, the poem is divided into nine stanzas, where each one has four lines. In addition to that, one can spot a few enjambements for instance (l.9-10). This stylistic device has the function to support the flow of the poem. Furthermore, it is crucial to take a look at the choice of words, when analysing the language.
This anthology is beautifully diverse and unique. Although the poems are new, they take reader back in time through issues that are relevant to the 21st century life. Most of the poems are experimental form probably because the poets are trying to get their voices heard by doing new things, which I think work well for a majority of these poems and others, not so much. Analicia Sotelo’s “I’m Trying to Write a Poem About A Virgin and It’s Painful” is an experimental prose form, and it’s beautiful. A part of the poem reads, “Some people said I should take her out of the poem. Other people said No, take her out of the lake and put her in the bedroom” (40). The poet making the process of writing a poem the poem itself is something new for me. The contrast in this piece also works well, although I still do not understand the metaphor of the lake. Also, Damian Caudill has a beautiful form in “Tuesday Ordinary.” The form and the style seem experimental but worthwhile. The poem is written from the perspective of Trayvon Martin’s hoodie, which many, especially in the African-American community believed contributed to his murder. The depth of thought that might have gone into the penning of this poem is commendable. However, I did not think this experimental form works well for “It was a miracle route everyone had been searching for and the story caused a sensation” on page 5. The later part of the first section left me with the question, “why is this a poem, or included in a poem? And I find it hard to comprehend why these different sections are fused under one poem. Also in Kara Kai Wang’s “Idiom,” I find the footnote alienating as a reader, because of the language used. I would have preferred if the footnoted words are in another languag...
With every different scene, Soto makes it flow very well by introducing each place with detail and what is surrounding the characters at that moment. I think it was thought out well and every “W” question can be answered easily. The poetic devices that I found were simile, metaphor, and personification. The similes within the poem were “tiered like bleachers,” and “fog hanging like old coats.” The metaphors that I found were “That was so bright against / The gray of December / That, from some distance, / Someone might have thought / I was making a fire in my hands.” and “Light in her eyes, a smile...” The personification I found was “a few cars hissing past,” and “the lady’s eyes met mine.” His tone in this poem was nonchalant but at the same time passionate. I used two opposite words to describe his tone because he is nonchalant in telling it; it is about something that was so simple. Though the tone is also passionate because it’s a bigger memory that someone could have and cherish. Soto’s attitude was more of carefree and nostalgic. This poem shows Gary Soto’s different colors and that is represented from when he was acknowledged for his first collection of poems in 1976 for the United States Award of the International Poetry Forum. I think that is a great accomplishment considering his family and education situation. Him and his family were struggling to find work as he was growing up, so instead of focusing on his
Within “Thanatopsis” by William Cullen Bryant, he states “She has a voice of gladness, and a smile/And eloquence of beauty, and she glides/Into his darker musings, with a mild/And healing sympathy (Bryant, 4-6).” The “she” Bryant is referring to is Mother Nature, which makes his statement that nature can take away a man’s pain that much more powerful. By personifying nature, the reader feels as though they can relate to “her” in a different way. A poem that uses powerful metaphors is “The First Snowfall” by James Russell Lowell. Within his poem, he states, “From sheds new-roofed with Carrara/Came Chanticleer’s muffled crow/The stiff rails were softened to swan’s-down/And still fluttered down the snow (Lowell, 9-12).” The line “from sheds new-roofed with Carrara” is referring to how pure and white the snow that had just recently fallen looks. Carrara is an expensive white marble. So, Lowell is comparing expensive items to the snow, which helps put an image of a beautiful snowfall into the reader’s head. By using both personification and metaphors, the reader can relate to the words being said in a completely different way, and thus understand the abstract ideas that the authors are trying to convey in their Romantic
Williams uses a lot of punctuation in his poetry. His sentences, although full of commas and semicolons, flow smoothly from line to line. He uses a lot of clauses and qualifications in his writing. Each stanza remains fresh, never becoming mundane or repetitive. He chooses words carefully, painting pictures with broad, smooth strokes rather than wispy phrases that are hard to follow.
T.S. Eliot had very philosophical and religious meanings behind this poem, and that helped me relate personally very well with this work of his. He used allusions to other poems, letting me make connections with works I have read before. He also used inclusive language and had the same opinion as me portrayed in this work. Based on these, T.S. Eliot has convinced me of his messages in this poem, as well as made this by far my favorite of his.
Ferguson, Margaret W., Salter, Mary J., and Stallworthy, Jon. The Norton Anthology of Poetry. fifth ed. N.p.: W.W. Norton, 2005. 2120-2121. 2 Print.
I do not know how without being culpably particular I can give my Reader a more exact notion of the style in which I wished these poems to be written, than by informing him that I have at all times endeavored to look steadily at my subject; consequently, I hope that there is in these Poems little falsehood of description, and my ideas are expressed in language fitted to their respective importance. Something I must have gained by this practice, as it is friendly to one property of all good poetry, namely, good sense; but it has necessarily cut me off from a large portion of phrases and figures of speech which from father to son have long been regarded as the common inheritance of Poets.
I believe that the structure of this poem allows for the speaker to tell a narrative which further allows him to convey his point. The use of enjambment emphasizes this idea as well as provides a sense of flow throughout the entirety of a poem, giving it the look and feel of reading a story. Overall, I believe this piece is very simplistic when it comes to poetic devices, due to the fact that it is written as a prose poem, this piece lacks many of the common poetic devices such as rhyme, repetition, alliteration, and metaphors. However, the tone, symbolism, allusion and imagery presented in the poem, give way to an extremely deep and complicated
Imagination plays a crucial role in creating communities and its identity. Fiction, in this case will cover both absolute fabrications and biases in the discourse of history's narration. History can be malleable in the hands of narrators, which they use to unite their audience into a common interpretation of their history. Alicia Barber, The author of the essay, Local Places, National Spaces: Public Memory, Community Identity and Landscape at Scotts Bluff National Monument, talks about two community's disagreement on a tourist spot's proper use and maintenance. Barber analyzes the community's relations to the landmark and how it affects the discourse of history's narration, the malleability of public memory, and how it all connects with community identity. Michael Ignatieff wrote about a civil struggle between two groups who identify themselves very differently from each other. In his analysis, he mixed his personal account of the situation, explaining the role of narcissism in the discourse of history's narration. His essay, The Warrior's Honor: Ethic War and the Modern Conscience, describes a more radical conflict from fabricated major differences. These two authors describe two very different approach to their conflicts, but their discourse to the narration of their history are similar. Their fabrications and biased narrations stem from their egocentric imaginations that support their identity.
Strand, Mark and Evan Boland. The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms. New
Kennedy, X. J., and Dana Gioia, eds. An Introduction to Poetry. 13th ed. New York: Longman, 2010. 21. Print.
Many writers use powerful words to portray powerful messages. Whether a writer’s choice of diction is cheerful, bitter, or in Robert Hayden’s case in his poem “Those Winter Sundays,” dismal and painful, it is the diction that formulates the tone of the piece. It is the diction which Hayden so properly places that allows us to read the poem and picture the cold tension of his foster home, and envision the barren home where his poem’s inspiration comes from. Hayden’s tumultuous childhood, along with the unorthodox relationships with his biological parents and foster parents help him to create the strong diction that permeates the dismal tone of “Those Winter Sundays.” Hayden’s ability to both overcome his tribulations and generate enough courage
Stevens’ message reveals itself as the poem unravels: there is never one true understanding of a reality outside of one’s interpretation. The author suggests that one can’t help but transfer their own beliefs and ideas onto what they see; in this case, the “listener” is projecting an impression of misery onto the scenery that lies before him. For example, the first two stanzas are filled with decorative language that serves to describe the visual image of a winter landscape. Using phrases such as “crusted with snow” (3) instead of “covered” with snow provides an evocative illustration of the snow’s roughness. Other phrases such as “shagged with ice” (5) and “rough in the distant glitter/Of the January sun” (6-7) force the reader to experience the miserable portrayal of winter. These are not the descriptions of an observer who “beholds nothing that is not there” (14-15), but rather the objective, poetic appreciation for the snowy