“scars” are a symbol for a bad memory where pain is a factor. Those bad memories remind him of the pain he suffered, hence, avoiding it. As the third stanza begins, the poem has more figurative meaning. The third stanza presents what the poem really is about. The poem goes on to portray how the scars we have on the outside can turn inward, and live inside of us. “…without intending to be”( with the use of anthropomorphism). In line 14, the author is referring to people. Everyone has masks to hide their true identity, to hide who they really are.
As the end of the poem approaches, there is a very evident shift ,begining in the thrid stanza and continues on.At this point in the poem, the persona takes his own emotional experience and relates it to how it has affected and shaped who he is. Cogswell uses a literary devices throughout the poem,mainly to emphasize the idea of “pain”.,
In the last line, it states that the reader is,at the end of it all, “a circular saw”. This metaphor is used to emphasize the fact that he has indeed become what he used to fear and what had brought him such a great deal of pain. The motif throughout this poem is the circular saw. This is,once more, used to represent pain. The title is used very efficiently in this poem.. Pain is a vicious cycle that circles around and around, just like a circular saw. The title is very relevant to the subject because it is a symbol of the pain.The title the author chose uses a practical item ( the circular saw) to explain a complex theory.
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