The Secretary Chant: Poem Analysis

As a literature lover, I spent a lot of time understanding what these poems are trying to say, and I enjoyed reading every single of them. As far as evaluating each of these poems, I need to say that the meaning of "The Secretary Chant" was pretty straight forward from my understanding. The poem reveals how the career of a secretary has taken away her life to the extent that she has forgotten herself as a woman. Moreover, because of the way the poet described her situation, we can realize that she talks about her job in a negative way because of the fact that she is tired of being a secretary. Personally, what I liked the most about this poem is the way the poet has related unrelated things to each other. For example, the poet has used the …show more content…
Also, what I understood from "what did I know of love 's austere and lonely offices" is that no one appreciated his father, and he was alone. "Austere" means lack of adornment which we can relate it his father who was working alone so hard so that his son lives a comfortable life. "Snapping Beans" was one of my favorite poems among others. I liked the poem so much because the poet 's situation is similar to mine when I first started the college. Just like the poet, I have a religious grandmother too who is traditional and not open minded enough to listen to what I tell her about college life. The whole "Nighttime Fires" poem has been built up upon a father 's anger, which can affect the future of the family considerably. The father 's anger is because of losing his job and getting poorer every day while some rich people have no problem in their lives. "Splitting the pencil between his teeth," emphasizes on the father 's madness more. Also, "my dad smiled a smile from a secret, brittle heart," means that her father was enjoying from watching the burning house to the extent that he would force his wife and children to come out and look at the scene together. Furthermore, what I understood from "his face lit up in the heat given off by destruction" is that the poet 's father was feeling relaxed and relief when watching the burned houses of rich people. The poet talks about her mother toward the end of the poem who is …show more content…
In other words, he is trying to explain the word loneliness with figures and letters, which is tough and unique. "Introduction to Poetry" was one of the easy and straightforward poems. In this poem, Billy Collins explains that how the readers want to get a brief meaning of what the poem says without paying attention to spending time on it and think about it to fully understand it. He believes that today 's readers don 't appreciate literature and the art of playing with the words and sentences. The only thing they might be interested in is understanding what the whole poem is about and who the poet is while they should think about each verse of the poem thoroughly and find out the meaning of it. "Oh, Oh" was the last poem which was a little bit difficult for me to understand but I liked the way the poet has used the situational irony to finish the poem. The phrases that the poet has used such as "moo cow" and "choo-choo" take us to our childhood memories, which I liked. Also, the poem gets hilarious toward the end when the reader expects to finish the poem with more romantic and sweet phrases. At the end of the poem, the poet says "And there, poised and growling, are fifty Hell 's Angels" which is what makes the poem hilarious in my opinion. Throughout the poem, the poet is talking about a girl and boy who are apparently in love with each other, which gives the sense of romance, love and joy to the reader. I 'm not sure why the poet has used the Hell 's