speaker's life. The speaker states that before their death, the room was so unbearably silent that the only noise heard was the sound of a fly buzzing, “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died - / The Stillness in the Room / Was like the Stillness in the Air - / Between the Heaves of Storm - /.” The reader can then conclude that the speaker was in a room with loved ones who had cried until they couldn’t anymore, “The Eyes around - had wrung them dry - / And Breaths were gathering firm /.” The speaker…
the poem “The Bachelor Watches ‘The Bachelor,’” the poet Jacob Saenz uses unparalleled imagery and alternating tones to push the point that the speaker is jealous of “The Bachelor”, and that he wants his life to have purpose like the bachelor’s. He wants to change his life, and give it purpose and he sees finding love as giving his life purpose. The speaker is himself a bachelor, implying that he is single or, in other words, all alone. He watches ABC’s “The Bachelor” every night it airs on his…
“we”. This signifies the speaker’s belief in a bigger world power. Him (the speaker) and this higher power are enveloped by the term “we”. The speaker goes on to describe his surroundings, “The view was all in lines/ Straight up and down of tall slim trees/ Too much alike to mark or name a place by/ So as to say for certain I was here/ Or…
discoveries: her love for and confidence in reading poetry. The poem begins with the speaker stumbling upon the book, which she says surprised her. The speaker goes in depth to describe the book, noting its “swans gliding on a blueback lake… posed on a placid lake, your name blurred underwater sinking to the bottom.” The use of imagery here is employed to demonstrate how quickly the speaker’s…
This idea is supported by the frequented use of self-address implemented in the second half. The speaker becomes more involved. “I thought,” “I looked,” “I admired,” all produce a more active role on the part of the speaker. The turning point in the poem that triggers this alteration seems to be when the reader realizes that the fish is in fact still alive. “While his gills were breathing” (line 22) is the first action given to the fish and the first time he is addressed as a living thing…
In life, the greatest struggles are what motivates people the most. Despite the violence and discrimination that the speakers faced, they were able to find a moment of understanding within their lives. These two poems work together to help describe that no matter the hardships people face, people can still succeed. Within the poem, “I Go Back to May 1937”, the speaker goes back to the time when her parents were in college. She begins by describing what she sees, her father walking out from…
” the speaker addresses the subject of desire through a series of poetic devices. The speaker believes that desire leads to foolishness. But if one desires to eliminate desire, then that desire is virtuous, not foolish. Sidney utilizes figurative language, repetition and anaphora throughout the poem to express his complex thoughts on desire. At the start of the poem, Sidney uses the visual metaphors to describe his view of what desire is. The first line of the poem depicts how the speaker…
At the beginning of the poem “Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden, the speaker introduces cold and uncomfortable images to relay the tone of the poem: Regret for not respecting his father. Hayden uses “blueback cold” in the second line, presenting a tone of sadness and loneliness throughout the house that the speaker and his family like in. The word “blueblack” is such an uncommon word that it carries an extremely negative feeling, exemplifying the cold feeling of distance throughout the…
others stand up for one’s personal interest, one must also defend others. Ogden’s poem was written in 1951, in response to a quote by Martin Niemoller, “First they came… No one left to speak out for me.” To help aid his ideal, Ogden creates a nameless speaker who is focused on self-preservation at the expense of other’s, which leads to his ultimate demise. To foreshadow the speaker’s willingness to turn a blind eye…
“Imagine the Angels of Bread” is a poem where the speaker lists the multiple injustices in the world and levels it out so that those suffering can have either justice or those committing the injustices are punished. In the poem’s multiple directions to “imagine,” Martin Espada presents a call to arms to the reader, encouraging them to imagine the wrongdoings and to hopefully act upon them. By getting the readers to imagine such injustice and by having hope that one day the wrongs will be righted…