5 A. M Mood

Both poems, “Five A.M” and “Five Flights Up” deal with the speaker’s reflections on their early morning surroundings and each utilize tone, structure, and imagery to make the speakers’ attitudes known to the reader. However, the attitudes of both speakers to the early morning vary immensely. Both poems show the speakers’ reflections on their early morning surroundings. However, the tone of both poems is vastly different. In “Five A.M,” the speaker is one with the environment. In the early morning, when it is “still dark, he is walking through his neighborhood and taking notice of the world around him. The mood in Five A.M. is very optimistic and positive. The new day’s morning infers the buoyant mood when it “breathes soft sound above the …show more content…
These differences in the reflections are brought about by a difference in the speakers’ states of minds. In Five A.M. the speaker displays positive imagery with a peaceful mindset, while in Five Flights Up, the speaker displays negative imagery and focuses on the questioning of day to day life. Imagery in Five A.M. is demonstrated in the second stanza: “There are people in every country who never turn into killers, saints have built sanctuaries on islands and live in valleys, conquerors have quit and gone home.” The speaker addresses images that portray evil or distress such as killers and conquerors and the reflection of them when they have quit and gone home. The speaker also portrays images that provide a sense of security and the good of home and routine, such as the saints, sanctuaries, and farmers working in the fields. The imagery in Five A.M. helps the reader understand the speaker’s altitude from imagery. The speaker in Five Flights Up uses the literary terms imagery and diction to show what the speaker is thinking. The speaker in Five Flights Up focuses on actions of the “Little black dog runs in his yard”, “His owner’s voice arises, stern, “You ought to be ashamed” and “The bird still sits there. Now he seems to yawn.”