The poem has amazing imagery setting, which creates the vivid nostalgic atmosphere. Adame begins his story with the image of his grandma rocking quietly in her armchair, maybe for hours, for he stated until her swelled hands/calmed. This is a common scene of elderliness, when people enjoy the calm and slow movement of time, silently rocking on the armchair watching the day passing by. She appears to be a typical grandma, who would feel cold in a hot summer day to wear thick socks and big sweaters. In the writers memory his grandma was really old and weak. She is also a person who would be glad to save any penny, as she laughs greedily going to Payless to buy cheap shoes. Even knowing Payless always sells cheap products, she would still wait until the check comes. This could be an embarrassing memory for a kid to be with his grandma, who goes excessively happy to save a few cents. However Adames flashback is immediately followed by the recall of his grandmothers warm and kind hearted actions. Every morning, when it is still early at dawn sunlight barely lit/the kitchen, his grandma would wake up before everybody else in the family, and prepare breakfast. The sound and smell of potatoes in frying saucepan would always wake him up, as a warm nurturous feeling to start the day. And although she makes nice hot meal for her children, she herself cannot enjoy it. She has lost her teeth, and can only eat bread soaked in coffee. As a kid perhaps he did not understand the feeling of that daily routine, but as he grows up and looks back to the past, it has a heartbreaking emotion. Adame realizes how hard it was for his grandmother. He also remembers how loving and caring she was to him.…
The role of family in Steven Herrick’s narrative verse poem ‘By the River’ incontestably shows its impact and importance towards a child's upbringing. The book talks about themes that develop through each poem showing the influence of a maternal figure's death, the family dynamic under the care of a father who has to play both the maternal and paternal role and how parents form the platform on which their child acts and behaves. In Steven Herrick's verse narrative, the impact of a parental figure's death, particularly the mother, is vividly portrayed against the backdrop of the 1960s where the ideal family dynamic often revolved around the presence of a mother figure, and families without such a figure were not merely pitied but often ostracised…
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…
The second part of the poem ‘Nightfall’ continues the story of the child forty years from ‘Barn owl’, where she had lost her innocence by shooting an owl and this had resulted in a heavy hearted guilt which was caused by her unknowing and stubborn actions. The poem represents death closing in on the father, and the limitations of time on their relationship that was never experienced before in her younger years. The father, who in the first poem is depicted as an “old no-sayer”, is now held in high esteem, he is admired and respected as an “old king”. The extended metaphor “Since there is no more to taste ripeness is plainly all. Father we pick our last fruits of the temporal.” Appeals to our senses and is now an aural metaphor, it illustrates the father’s life becoming fulfilled or ripe, it has come near to its end and the father and child will now spend or pick the last moments of the father’s life together. Over time her appreciation of her father has changed, this is shown through “Who can be what you were?” and “Old King, your marvellous journey’s done.” She has realised the valuable life her father has led and the great loss that will be felt after he is gone. The child, now a grown woman learns another lesson about death, it can be quiet and peaceful, and “Your night and day…
The two poems Apology to My Father by David Hutchison, and On the Birth of a Son by David Campbell, are very different at first glance. On closer examination of the similarities and differences of: audience, language, themes, messages, structure and readers role, connections can be made. Readers are rewarded by carefully reading these poems.…
Margaret not only writes novels but also expresses her feelings and views through poems. Most of her poems reflect a lot of dismay and loss, which is connected to the death of her father and “the realization of her mortality” ("Margaret Atwood," Poetry Foundation).…
I believe I was most focus on the detail of the fathers’ hands. After rereading and thinking about what each word meant, and analyzing the reaction of the other characters (son and mother) in the poem I began to picture exactly what the poem was about. I think the meaning of this poem, was about a hardworking man. A man that had a few drinks than decide to dance and hang out with his son. The mother thought that the father’s drinking was getting out of hand. In this poem I think it sends out a message to the parents. No matter how young your child is, they acknowledge lots of things and it will stick to their minds. For instances, I quote Theodore Roethke “Papa’s Waltz”– “The whiskey on your breath Could make a small boy dizzy But I hung on like death Such waltzing was not easy”, (Clugston, 2010, Ch. 10.5). This would be something for a kid to remember, the strong smell of liquor coming from his father was hard for him to inhale while dancing together. I believe things happening in this poem are experienced by many…
In both poems the speakers realized the fragility of life when they heartbroken face the fact of losing their parents. In “A Woman Mourned by Daughters” the author of this poem made the daughters the speaker and the mother the auditor. In “do not go gentle into that good night” he talks about his father, who was dying. In “A woman mourned by Daughters” speaker makes you feel sorry for the mother, perhaps in other hand, she also feels sorry for the daughters. The mother was died and leave alone her daughters with remaining all burdens. The daughters went through all this and have to live with it for the rest of their lives. "You are swollen till you strain this house and the whole sky" (Rich 4-5). That is why, the mood was sound like little…
The “Morning Song” uses many language features throughout the poem to provide clear imagery, which shows how the arrival of the baby has affected the speaker’s life. First, the poem starts with the picture of a “fat gold watch,” which expresses the speaker’s idea that time is being taken away from her and that having a child is an enduring responsibility. In addition, the watch also represents the baby’s heartbeat, which is a constant reminder of the baby’s presence. Then the speaker goes on to create an image in the reader’s mind of a “New statue. In a drafty museum.” This image shows a variety of emotions the speaker feels, such as resent, pain, and sorrow. Additionally, the use of “statue” depicts an attitude of resent because it describes a sense of permanence, which the speaker has now recognized that her child has been born. Also, the use of “drafty museum,” creates an idea of distance between the speaker and her child. The statement, “I’m no more your mother,” is another example of the speaker’s attitude, which shows her distance and anger. Another image that aids in the expression of the speaker’s attitude is when she says, “Your mouth opens clean as a cat’s.” This depicts the distinct and loud crys of the infant, which wakes the speaker at night, and it once again shows the distance between the speaker and her infant when she refers to the baby as if it were an object by calling it a cat. These vivid images definitely…
Gwendolyn Brooks' poem "The Mother" uses strong and empathetic language, as well as vivid images, to communicate the devastating emotional effect of her…
Whenever a poem is written without a clear understanding on how it should be interpreted both positive and negative emotions arise. One might try to pick up on the catchy rhymes that are meant for it to be comical, while other notice the harsh adjective and nouns associating with death. When a poem combines the innocence of a child at play associating with a drunken, hardworking father a lighthearted and brutal mental picture arises in one’s head. In the poem “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodor Roethke, elements of humor and fear arise in many scholars interpretations, while I believe that the elements of fear coming from the young boys lines eliminate any humorous aspect.…
The poem opens with “my gentle father”, the possessive pronoun “my” expresses the relationship, the belonging the father and son feel together. The positive connotation of the adjective “gentle” creates the loving calm tone of the relationship. Peter rejects aspects of his father’s life in Australia of keeping his Polish traditions alive here including how his friends “shook hands too violently”. The incident with the “crew-cut, grey-haired Department clerk” allows Peter to accept Feliks’ decision to retreat to the garden protected by the “golden cypress” and gains an understanding of his old ways.…
The poem “Daddy” is written in free verse which has no specific rhyme scheme but it consist of many end and internal rhymes. She uses a sort of nursery rhyme, singsong way of dialogue with short lines, and repeated rhymes. The words like "Jew," "through," "do,” “you” shows that the oo sound is overpowering in the poem which gives a childish cadence. Through this she tries to establish and highlights her status as a child in relation to her authoritative father. Throughout the poem the tone varies from childlike adoration and admiration to that of a horrendous and desperate adult.…
The poem “Mothers” by Nikki Giovanni is about two states of mind. An adult dealing with the ups and downs of everyday life and a concerned child. This is shown by the use of opposite words. “Dark-light” and “pleasantries and unpleasantries.” Being a child, Nikki was trying to make sense of what was happening around her. She sees her mother sitting in a chair in a dark room upset her. Nikki is apparently a frightened child. The wetting of the bed confirms her fear. She wrote about and absent father, so her mother is the only protection she had. She is afraid to loose her hence the search of strength in her mother.…
In “Piano”, The persona in the poem is listening to a woman singing and playing the piano. This makes him recall when he was a child, sitting under the piano listening to his mother play and sing on Sunday evenings in winter. He is nostalgic about the warmth and happiness of his childhood days. However, he seems to berate himself on recalling his childhood and views himself as sad and less masculine for giving in to his nostalgic impulses. With his ‘manhood cast/Down in the flood of remembrance’, he weeps, an act considered inappropriate for a man.…