Both swallowed in their job, the janitor in “Jorge the Church Janitor Finally Quits” by Martin Espada and the secretary in “The Secretary Chant” by Marge Piercy feel unappreciated and lost as employees. Jorge is “outside…of [Americans] understanding” and The Secretary is lost in her work and compares herself to objects such as her “hips are a desk.” The employees from these poems have become hidden behind their duties and are slowly sinking into the unknown.…
Stanford and University of California alumni Sandra Lim reads from The Wilderness on April 7, 2015, at Prairie Lights. As an alumna from the International Writing Program Lim was making her return back to Iowa City after 11 years. In The Wilderness Lim reads a collection of poems about love, spring and one poem that caught my attention was about the individual struggle of one's body within one’s mind. The poems are open to many interpretations but that is the way that I chose to interpret that poetry in particular. The interesting thing about Lim’s poem is how describes the body parts in some of her poems. It is very vague. It almost makes me feel a little bit uncomfortable but at the same time, I really like her style. The way she describes…
Sharon Olds in "On the Subway" writes the poem to contrast the lives of a Caucasian woman and an African American boy. It displays how the narrator realizes the bonds they share because of their fear for each other.…
Imagine being abused, hit, yelled at, and left alone without the most important feeling of love. Growing up without a shoulder to cry on or a hand to hold. How would these actions sculpt you as an individual? Would they compel you to do the same actions to your own loved ones, or show them love and compassion, which your life had lacked? Poets tend to write pieces of literature as reflections back on their personal lives, describing situations that stay afloat in their heads. Sharon Olds’ happened to be one of these poets, who expressed her upsetting past relationship with her father and current relationships with her children through these works of art. In Olds’ first poems, she…
1 Victoria NicholsonFifteen is a poem written by William Stafford. The theme of this poem is about a young boy trying to have freedom. The boy finds a bike, he wants to ride it to freedom but realizes he’s still a child at only 15. “I stood there 15”. Metaphors in this poem “south of the bridge on 17th” the bridge is hiswhere the boys journey to adulthood begins.…
The song " Just a Girl" by No Doubt shows the stereotypes, oppressions and standards that women are subjected to in our society. The author feels oppressed because she is "...just a girl" and because of that the author thinks that" ...I'm just a girl, all pretty and petite So don't let me have any rights". The oppression makes the author feel lesser than a man even though she is aware that she doesn't need a man she feels that "This world is forcing me to hold your hand" .The author's decision to include these lines also help show the stereotypes that women are all expected to be small and weak and always need a men to help them become something.…
A tattoo is like poetry, because there is always more to the story than what meets the eye! The sonnet “First Poem for You” by Kim Addonizio is a riveting piece of poetry that uses symbolization to help guide the readers to understand the emotions and feelings the woman has towards her partner. Visual and tactile imagery used within this poem helps readers interpret the meaning of the poem. The theme is longevity and the true meaning of a relationship. In Addonizio “First Poem for You,” Addonizio utilizes literary elements to develop the story and detail a fictional character that is in love with a man that has permanent tattoos. Upon analyzing the symbols, visual imagery and theme throughout this poem the readers will better comprehend the poem to its entirety; these elements symbolize permanence, which is the meaning of the entire poem.…
At the beginning of the poem, there is a use of cacophonic sounds of “branching vines.” “Burred faintly belching bogs” are used to describe the ugly sounds of the swamp as the character takes a step forward; which only add more to the misery and struggle of the speaker. The repetition of the word “Here” is also very unique because it is emphasizing the location of where the character is being tortured by having to walk into this swamp of misery and struggle. There is another sound the speaker describes “that sink silently on to the black slack earthsoup” (lines 20-22). This diction considered as imagery, because it is making a comparison between the swamp and earthsoup.…
In her poem, "The Race", author Sharon Old's conveys meaning to her audience and poem through the use of imagery, parallelism, and tension, which complement the structure of her poem and add emotion that appeals to her audience.…
Maxine Kumin definitely has a very shocking way of portraying her poetry. It can easily be seen that she has a deep love for nature and animals. However, it goes to a much further distance than your average person. In the poem “Morning Swim” and “To Swim, to Believe” she describes swimming, as obviously mentioned in the title. In “Morning Swim” she describes becoming one with the body of water as she travels through it. In “To Swim, to Believe” she describes Jesus walking on the water, as described in the Bible. She states about how Peter had doubt about what Jesus told him to do, and thus as a result fell into the water. This poem demonstrates the importance of believing. “Heaven as Anus” is a very strong poem. It describes the multiple horrors and atrocities that animals face while they are facing testing and experiments. The poem really stabs at you and expresses its opinion with feeling. For example, “The whitewall labs fill up with the feces of fear.” (Kumin) “Requiem on I-89” describes the carcasses of animals being devoured on the road. She shirks in no details at all. The putrid, split carcasses strewn across the road are explained in vivid detail. For example, “lies on its side, bust open.” (Kumin)…
Strategy 1: Mrs. Weaver, lectures her students about understanding and interpreting poems the correct away to find the true meaning of poems. Mrs. Weaver, allows students to know they are learning strategies to assist a student to understand and appreciate poems and encourage the student to read poetry more effectively. To expand students thinking further Mrs. Weaver discuss the meaning of the poem by asking students questions. She asked a few volunteers to read a few sentences aloud. My beliefs are that ELLs will be adapted to better meet the learning needs of this lesson plan if they are allowed to first read the material in L1 their native language and L2 English language before teaching the text to the whole class. Students are asking to identify the metaphors in the poem and discuss with your group members.…
“Girl,”written by Jamaica Kincaid, is a prose poem about the relationship between a mother and daughter. In reality, it reflects the actual living background in Kincaid's time by listing a series of important sentences; as read, it shows that her mother disciplined her for a certain lifestyle and now she wants the same living for her daughter. In this poem, the setting, tone, and characters engage and work together to create an acute description of a day-to-day conversation between mother and daughter.…
The works we studied within Creative Writing were all helpful in creating my own works to submit to the class. Throughout all of the reading, many of the works inspired me in different ways, whether it was short story plot ideas or word usage in the poems. While crafting my work for the final portfolio, I reviewed many of the poems from our poetry packet in an effort to find inspiration and to create new interesting images. I took the most inspiration for my formal poem, which I found most difficult to write. One of the poems that was most useful to me was Jilly Dybka’s “Memphis, 1976.” Dybka’s poem follows the sestina form; I also wrote my last poem in this form, so it helped to follow the form by looking at her poem as an example. Dybka’s…
The poem is about daylight saving time. Daylight Saving Time (DST) is an age-old practice where people would advance time by one hour to extend daylight time into the night. In effect, they would sacrifice sunrise time, also by one hour. People in the regions affected would adjust their clocks around the start of spring. They would change them back to normal time when summer ends. This practice has its root in early societies before the invention of the modern clock. Because most societies were agrarian at the time, and farm work was majorly dependent on daylight, people would plan their day and adjust their time according the length of daylight. Where daylight extended into the night, people would adjust their clocks to accommodate the new timeline, which, in this case, will also continue well into the night.…
I hated poetry. I realize that sometimes people have difficulty verbalizing there feelings. That's perfectly fine. I realize that certain words can be symbolic. That's fine as well, however I didn't see the point in any poetry that didn't sound like it came from a Dr. Seuss book. How people were able to identify with certain poets and comprehend the deeper meanings behind their works was beyond me, but who was I to judge? Then one night I discovered a poem about hands, not how hands symbolize some greater meaning in life, just about hands. Hands and love. That night I learned to love poetry, learned to understand how it can convey feeling in ways the verbal descriptions can't. That somehow you can learn all of life's lessons from a…