Five Ways to Kill a Man

Five Ways to Kill a Man Five ways to kill a man is a poem written by Edwin Brock. This poem is very basic. The poet does not beat around the bush. He gets right to the point. This is the reason why it was easy to tell what the poet was trying to portray with this poem. The way I look at this poem is very simple. I see this poem as a rant about how we as people are going to destroy ourselves by conforming to the normal. While reading the poem you would come to believe that the poem is a list of ways to kill a man. However, I believe it is much deeper than that. This poem is about every terrible thing we have done to each other. The first stanza is about crucifixion of Jesus Christ, the second one is about the war of roses which was a war fought in England where people used farm tool as weapons to pierce the “metal cages”. The third stanza is about world war two when the German army blew mustard gas at the allies when they were in the trenches. The fourth stanza is about the bombing of Hiroshima and Nagasaki. The final stanza wraps up the entire poem saying, all those ways are very intricate and the most efficient way to kill another person is let him live in the twentieth century. The reason why the poet says this is to illustrate the conformity that is happening in the twentieth century with the introduction of theatre and all these ideals. This is what I believe the poet was attempting to portray in this poem.