If I were asked who the most precious people in my life are, I would undoubtedly answer: my family. They were the people whom I could lean on to matter what happens. Nonetheless, after overhearing my mother demanded a divorce, I could not love her as much as how I loved her once because she had crushed my belief on how perfect life was when I had a family. I felt as if she did not love me anymore. Poets like Philip Levine and Robert Hayden understand this feeling and depict it in their poems “What Work Is” and “Those Winter Sundays.” These poems convey how it feels like to not feel love from the family that should have loved us more than anything in the world. Yet, they also convey the reconciliation that these family members finally reach because the speakers can eventually see love, the fundamental component of every family in the world, which is always presence, indeed. Just like I finally comprehended the reason behind my mother’s decision was to protect me from living in poverty after my father lost his job. “What Work Is” narrates about the brotherly love between the speaker and his brother that seems to be fading away. Almost at the end of Levine’s poem, the speaker asks himself, “How long has it been since [he] told [his brother] / [he] loved him” (Levine 33-34)? This question implies that it has been a long time since the speaker once confessed his love. In other words, as they grow up, the speaker is not able to associate himself to his brother anymore as if he was a stranger because his brother is too busy working. He works an eight-hour night shift at Cadillac, sleeps during the day, and studies German at noon; there is not any time left in his schedule to have a quality time with the speaker. Describing his broth... ... middle of paper ... ...he way love is performed and the price a family member might have to pay for the sake of the integrity of one’s family, at the end of the day, family will always be the people who loves us the most. Works Cited Hayden, Robert. ”Those Winter Sundays.” Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Ed. John Schilb and John Clifford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2012. Print. Levine, Philip. ”What Work Is.” Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Ed. John Schilb and John Clifford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2012. Print. “New Poet Laureate Philip Levine's 'Absolute Truth'.” NPR Books. n.p., 14 August 2011. Web. 7 Feb. 2014. “Philip Levine.” Poetry Foundation. n.p.,n.d. Web. 7 Feb. 2014. Williams, Pontheolla T. Robert Hayden: A Critical Analysis of His Poetry. Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 1987. Print.
Schilb, John , and John Clifford. "Orientation ." Making Literature Matter An Anthology for Reading and Writing. 5th ed. Boston, New York: Bedford/St. Martin's, 2012. . Print
Meyer, Michael, ed. The Bedford Introduction to Literature: Reading, Thinking, Writing. 5th ed. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin's, 1999.
“Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden, “My Father as a Guitar” by Martin Espada, and “Digging” by Seamus Heaney are three poems that look into the past of the authors and dig up memories of the authors fathers. The poems contain similar conflicts, settings, and themes that are essential in helping the reader understand the heartfelt feelings the authors have for their fathers. With the authors of the three poems all living the gust of their life in the 1900’s, their biographical will be similar and easier to connect with each other.
Glaspell, Susan. Trifles. Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Ed. John Schilb and John Clifford. Boston: Bedford / St. Martin's, 2000. 127-137.
Billy Collins is one of the most credited poets of this century and last. He is a man of many talents, most recognized though by his provocative and riveting poetry. As John McEnroe was to the sport of tennis, Billy Collins has done the same for the world of poetry. Collin’s rejected the old ways of poetry, created his own form, broke all the rules, and still retains the love and respect of the poet community. Collins has received the title of Poet Laureate of the United States twice and also has received countless awards and acknowledgements. He has achieved this through a style of poetry that is not over-interpreted and hard to understand to most, but that of the complete opposite, his poetry is hospitable and playful.
With all this forgetting, we've also forgotten that God gave Adam and Eve a chance to recreate a world mirroring the beauty and goodness of the lost one. Yet, as their heirs, we've constructed an earth where "we live inside a history that no longer remembers us." Weigl wonders if we reinvent history to give ourselves identity, rendering ourselves powerless because we're unconscious of our present. He examines human suffering, hedonism, and desire, wondering if we can re-learn how to love, be loved, and forgive. As a mature poet working at the height of his craft, Weigl writes that we must weed out "the snare of the devil in our hearts" to pass through the visible end of the twentieth century bravely, with grace.
Hansberry, Lorraine. ?A Raisin in the Sun.? Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Eds. John Schilb and John Clifford. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin?s 2008.
The poem “Those Winter Sundays” displays a past relationship between a child and his father. Hayden makes use of past tense phrases such as “I’d wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking” (6) to show the readers that the child is remembering certain events that took place in the past. Although the child’s father did not openly express his love towards him when he was growing up, the child now feels a great amount of guilt for never thanking his father for all the things he actually did for him and his family. This poem proves that love can come in more than one form, and it is not always a completely obvious act.
Schlib, John and John Clifford. Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. 5th ed.
Samuels, Ian. “Books highlight poetry’s past and present.” Calgary Herald [Calgary], 18 October 2003, p. ES12.
Robert Hayden is an author whose childhood, like many others, helped shaped his perception on life. As a child, Hayden suffered through a family crises where his biological parents separated after his birth and soon after, he became the foster son of his neighbors (Gates and Smith, 225). This crucial family division has lead Hayden to write many works demonstrating his hardships throughout this experience. Focusing on one of his poems “Those Winter Sundays,” he depicts the troublesome relationship between his foster father, as discussed in class, and himself. A feelings of regret are shown throughout the poem because of the lack of appreciation the speaker had towards his father as a child. Hayden writes, “what did I know, what did I know,”
Shelley, Percy Bysshe. A Defense of Poetry. Critical Theory Since Plato: Third Edition. Adams, Hazard and Searle, Leroy. Boston, Massachusetts: Thomson Wadsworth, 2005: (537-551).
Schilb, John, and John Clifford, eds. Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2003.
Glaspell, Susan. Trifles. Making Literature Matter: An Anthology for Readers and Writers. Ed. John Schilb and John Clifford. Boston: Bedford / St. Martin's, 2005.
The poem, “What Work Is” by Philip Levine is an intricate and thought-provoking selection. Levine uses a slightly confusing method of describing what work actually is. He gives the idea that work is very tedious, however necessary. It is miserable, however, it is a sacrifice that is essentially made by many, if not all able-bodied members of society. Many have to sacrifice going to a concert or a movie, but instead works jobs with hardly a manageable salary. This poem seems to have a focus on members of the lower-class or middle-class who live paycheck to paycheck and are unable to put money away for a future for their children or for a vacation and how difficult life can be made to be while living under this type of circumstance. Levine