Suicide Note And Talamantez On The Last Day Of Second Grade Analysis

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Taking criticism can be a difficult thing, but it allows individuals to be guided away from poor practices and be led towards proficient ones. The problem is that our supporters, such as our educators and parents, pass their limits when trying to correct others for their benefit, or in some cases for their own satisfaction, which often leads them to over criticize. This causes individuals such as students and the children of parents to be pushed over the edge, or in very few cases, accept it and honor their selves for their effort. Janice Mirikitan’s “Suicide Note” and Rosemary Catacalos’s “David Talamantez on the Last Day of Second Grade” are two poems that describe how two different characters in similar situations chose to cope with the harsh criticism that they receive from others. In both poems, the characters struggle to meet the expectations of others; however each character receives and copes with the criticism from either their educator, or parents, in distinct ways. Both poems tell the reader how each character has failed to meet the high standards of others, in these cases, from parents and an educator. In “Suicide Note”, the character is harshly criticized by her parents, who hold high academic standards …show more content…
“So I have worked hard./ not good enough”(28-29). After giving all her effort to excel in college to please her parents, she gives up. She decides the way out of all the criticism is to free herself. The way she describes freeing herself was by the use of imagery of a bird flying off an edge, her being the bird. “This air will not hold me, / the snow burdens my crippled wings,” (44-45). She is damaged from working hard to meet her parent’s high expectations, and there is nothing to hold her back from her decision of committing suicide. She copes with the criticism from her parents through death, and becomes

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