Summary Of Killing Time By Simon Armitage

The April 1999 excerpt of “Killing Time” by Simon Armitage narrates the Columbine High School Massacre and comments on the subsequent political debates using flowers and botanical language to represent the violence and weaponry. This poem presents a tragic and horrific event that was fresh in the minds of Armitage’s original readers, evoking the horror and sadness with its descriptions of each murder while also showing the wonder the public felt at the massacre with the beautiful descriptions of the flowers. Armitage recreates the effect of the Columbine Massacre by recounting the story but using literal “flowery” language that with its understatement, intensifies the effect of the violent depictions. This poem recreates the horrified wonder people felt following the Columbine Massacre. Reading the poem, one is ensnared by the beauty of the flowers while simultaneously being sickened by the story being retold, which is familiar to most. The reader moves from line to line, picturing the flowers exploding from lockers as in line 51, but remains acutely aware of the truth the flowers represent. The reader is left dazed by the imagery and disturbed by the event recounted. …show more content…
This replacement creates a fantastical image in the reader’s mind which mirrors the shock of the public immediately after the Massacre occurred. The floral imagery is familiar to readers, but the context it is used in is horrific, which further disturbs the reader. The structure of the poem is simple and makes the narrative flow easily, accompanied by the picturesque language that makes up the outermost layer of the poem. The longer the reader is drawn in by the poem, the more disturbing it