African American poets

Humans are surrounded by poverty everywhere they go, but never realized the long lasting effects of it in our society and individuals. In the essay "Black Hair" by Gary Soto, he explains the life of a young seventeen year old Mexican who struggles on the streets to make a decent living . Soto is able to portray the emotions and experiences of his life by writing the essay in first person. The audience has the opportunity to relate towards what life is when not having a place to sleep at night,…

Two poets describe the American plight and experience of the 19th and early 20th century in more detail and emotion than any other poets – Walt Whitman and Carl Sandburg. From two different generations, the younger writer’s content and style is very much an extension of his elder, Whitman. Both write, in a very casual style, about the suffering of the common man that they saw firsthand; Whitman’s “I Sit and Look Out” and Sandburg’s “Chicago” provide great examples of their observations of the…

Milestone Two The two poems being used for this assignment are Sylvia Plath’s “mad girls love song” and Nikki Giovanni’s “balance.” Mad girls love song is about a girl that feels like the man she fell in love with isn’t real, but just something she created in her own head because he suddenly disappeared and never returned. Balance is about the balance of black and white, truth and lies, love and loneliness. The purpose of this paper is to analyze the linguistic principles demonstrated in each of…

2nd Essay: Responding to Poetry Poetry mainly describes love, loss, and regret. However, every writer adds his or her own twist. For example, “Last Night” by Sharon Olds and “Cherrylog Road” by James Dickey deals with the same theme but are two different pieces of writing. They explore the theme of forbidden love and use imagery to show the lust between the two characters. In this essay I will compare and contrast the two poems by presenting different examples. Titles can say a lot about a…

Faulkner’s “A Rose for Emily,” all explore this difference between the “American dream” and real life in America. Specifically, although approaching the subject in different ways, ultimately these three works all show that there are various common misconceptions associated with the American…

Maya Angelou: Strength of the Human Spirit “We delight in the beauty of the butterfly, but rarely admit the changes it has gone through to achieve that beauty”, [are the famous words of former author, singer, dancer, and poet, Maya Angelou. The famous role model has won many awards including two NAACP Image Awards in the outstanding literary work category, achieved many goals by becoming an activists, and left many marks on the world in her various poems, stories, and biographies. She was…

Freedom Freedom is a word that can be defined in many ways to different minds, but in literary terms freedom means “the state of not being imprisoned or enslaved”. Two great poets by the name of Maya Angelou and Langston Hughes wrote two extraordinary poems called “I know why the caged bird sings” and “Democracy”. These two poems open your eye to the word freedom. I choose these two poems because, me personally being of Haitian decent I see how my people are treated and thought of. We think we…

thousands of years ago or the segregation of blacks and whites in America 50 years ago; inequality has always separated classes. Langston Hughes, an African American poet front the Harlem Renaissance writes mostly about racial inequality in the poem “Let America Be America Again.” This work is about how all immigrants who come to America in pursuit of the American Dream quickly realize that the actions necessary to achieve their dreams and liberate themselves from the inequality that is natives…

Dove’s familiar campaign promotes healthy image standards, but ironically the corporation also owns Axe, which is one company that imposes such ideals. From day one, children are bombarded with ads, pictures, and expectations. While there have been movements to improve self-image in adolescents, companies are merely capitalizing on the trend to sell their products without regards for their impacts. Our society defines people by appearance, and individuals cannot escape those superficialities…

greatest African American poets. The theme of freedom is represented by the poem “Caged Bird.” Many symbols are deciphered between a caged bird, a free bird, a cage and nature. The poem focuses on the caged bird crying out for his freedom, while the free bird roams around nature and flying freely. Imagery demonstrates the difference between a caged bird and a free bird. Stanzas one and four explain the free bird and what it is doing freely; “The free bird thinks…