In the poem Blackberries for Amelia, author Richard Wilbur paints a rustic and mellow portrait of an unnamed character harvesting wild blackberries. The diction is sharp and descriptive, with the usage of words such as “savage,” “spur,” “brambled,” “bolt,” and “ripen.” This lends to Wilbur’s heady descriptions of the blackberries, the most important symbols in the poem. The imagery is rich, going so far as to even describe the berries as “savagely sweet,” and writes extensively on the wild tangles and vines of the blackberry bushes. Wilbur describes this cluster of blackberry bushes vividly, commenting on the “brambled” light, the “chalky white flowers, with blooms of five.”…
Do you still think about what you did in your childhood? In the story Marigolds by: Eugenia Collier, the main character Lizabeth does something in her childhood that she still thinks about in her adulthood. Lizabeth and her friends tease Miss. Lottie, the old lady on the block. In the Marigolds i've came up with two themes: Don't hold on to your childhood and you can see the beauty out of life if you're willing to look for it.…
Throughout the story, Lizabeth and Miss Lottie, a very poor old woman, experience hope in similar ways. Lizabeth describes her neighbor, “Now at the end of that life [Miss Lottie] had nothing except a falling-down hut, a wrecked body, and John Burke, the mindless son of her passion. Whatever verve there was left in her, whatever was of love and beauty and joy that had not been squeezed out by life, had been there in the marigolds she had so tenderly cared for” (638). Miss Lottie believed in her Marigolds, which were a symbol of the hope John Burke and her poverty were unable to provide. When a person has a belief to give her hope for the future, it makes her present hardship easier to…
In “Marigolds” by Eugenia Collier, the marigolds represent hope to Miss Lottie. First, Miss Lottie sees the kids destroying her flowers she gets very upset and enraged. “She shook her stick at us and started shakily toward the road crying” (146). After her flowers were destroyed, she had nothing else to do besides cry. These marigolds meant a lot to her and her flowers were destroyed right in front of her eyes.…
Elizabeth is her own antagonist, she is trying to stop herself from finding her true self by clinging on to childhood and not embracing the beginning of adulthood. It has become such an obstacle that she is extremely confused about what she is, when her father cries that moment pushes her over the edge and she starts a rampage of destroying Miss Lottie’s marigolds.…
Everyone goes through a dreary point in their lives. In these times, it is critical to remain hopeful and search for the light at the end of the tunnel. To remain focused on the silver lining in the dark rain cloud. “Marigolds” by Eugenia Collier conveys imagery by contrasting hope in dark times through yellow, hopeful, marigolds against a decaying, rotting, town. Mrs. Lotties beautiful, flourishing, yellow marigolds contrast against the rotting house they stand before.…
Explication of “Where the Sidewalk Ends” Shel Silverstein’s poem “Where the Sidewalk Ends” is an eclectic concoction; it begins with a playful, childlike stock while stirring in a deeper, mature message. The poem starts its journey in a magically enchanting world, but it shifts suddenly as it travels into darkness. To escape, the speaker suggests following the arrows the children have drawn, pointing away from the grimness to “go where the chalk-white arrows go... To the place where the sidewalk ends” (14,16).…
Throughout the entire essay, imagery is used to create a feeling of love instead of pain and suffering. This being another underlying literary theme. Annie uses the metaphor “was the whole weasel still attached to his feathered throat, a fur pendant?” (Dillard) to show the fearlessness of the weasel. Another example of a metaphor in the non-fiction states, “Our eyes were interlocked, and someone threw away the key” (Dillard).…
This can be seen in lines 15-23 when she reflects back on her childhood. The most prominent memory of her home town, which was poverty stricken, is of Miss Lottie's marigolds. “Whenever the memory of those marigolds flashes across my mind, a strange sense of nostalgia comes with it… I recall that devastating moment when I was suddenly more woman than child, years ago in Miss Lottie's yard.” This is still relevant today because many people have moments where they realize they are more adult than child and typically an object or feeling represent that moment. The object or feeling could be anything from a pillow to a piece of furniture to guilt to a flower.…
In the short story Marigolds, Collier uses Imagery, Flashback, and Juxtaposition to create her voice. She writes that “I remember , another incongruency of memory- a brilliant splash of sunny yellow against the dust. ”(16), which is an example of juxtaposition because it's comparing both things for a purpose. An example of imagery is “multicolored skein of fourteen-going-on-fifteen as I recall that devastating moment where i was more women than child. ”(17)…
In the story it says, “I leaped furiously into mounds of marigolds and pulled madly, trampling and pulling and destroying the perfect yellow blooms.” Lizabeth got so angry with everything that was happening and ended up going back to the marigolds and destroying the rest of them. The text also says, “‘M-miss Lottie!’ I scrambled to my feet and just stood there and stared at her, and that was the moment when childhood faded and womanhood began. That violent, crazy act was the last act of childhood.”…
In The Flowers by Alice Walker, Myop’s innocence is emphasized by many literary devices, such as, symbolism, metaphor, hyperbole, onomatopoeia, tone, and imagery. Walker named the main character, Myop on purpose as it is short for myopia, which is the scientific term for, nearsightedness. This is an example of symbolism because in most parts of the story, Myop is a very innocent and pure girl, and is not able to see farther than the idealistic beauty of her childhood. To Myop, the harvesting of crops “[makes] each day a golden surprise” (Walker, 1).…
John Steinbeck’s ‘’The Chrysanthemums’ is about a proud and resilient woman, Elisa Allen, who is frustrated with her life. Her inability to conceive a child and her husband’s failure to love her are major issues in her family. The flower garden is her only distraction from all her marriage issues. In the garden, she tends lovely chrysanthemums. “Chrysanthemums’ symbolizes Elisa’s and every other woman’s inner-self.…
Second, the poem called There Is a Garden in Her Face, written by Thomas Campion, describes the perspective of love, based on external beauty. The male reciter in the poem discusses how magnificent the woman is, based on her glorious face. To make the readers understand his visual perception, he uses plenty of metaphors, similes, and symbolism to describe the woman in the most extraordinary way possible. Examples of these figures of speech include that the female’s face can compare with a garden with plenty of sweet fruits. When people plant gardens, it can represent nature appreciation and well as the respect for the purity and quality of fresh abundance of food.…
The poem is based on a real experience of William Wordsworth’s that reminisced with him for the rest of his life. Whilst on a walk to a lake, Wordsworth discovers a field of daffodils, causing him to make a revelation about the sublime in nature. The majority of the poem is centred around the daffodils. The conclusion of the poem then depicts Wordsworth sitting at home on his couch, reflecting back on the daffodils and the emotions they provoked from him. Through this poem William Wordsworth is expressing both the beauty and importance of nature.…