I chose to do my paper over the poem “Love is Not All” by Edna St. Vincent Millay, due to the fact that it was the first poem to catch my eye, because when I first saw it, I was actually getting over a hard time in my life, and reading the title made me interested in what the poem was about. At first when I read the poem, I was super confused, but looking deeper into it, I realized the poem truly had a meaning.
The poem starts off with someone in love, depicting what the love of her significant other (aka her schmoopie) is not. For example, she states that “it is not meat nor drink nor slumber nor a roof against the rain (Millay 1-2).” In other words, love does not fill you, or quench hunger or thirst, neither does it offer the necessary rest needed or even shelter. It doesn’t provide us with the necessary things we need to survive. At this point of the poem the message I’m getting from it is that love is not the only thing needed for survival. I sense sassiness in the poet's tone and a hint of anger. This line in the poem is very tense, and it seems like the author is just
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Vincent Millay, finally reveals that although love isn’t everything, without it, it leaves you with an empty feeling and she’d rather have that love than peace. Millay’s title of the poem is very misleading, because in the first half of the poem she goes on about how love isn’t all, but at the end she says “I might be driven to sell your love for peace, Or trade the memory of this night for food. It well may be. I do not think I would” (Millay 12-14). Here, she makes the claim that she would not trade love for physical survival, and in a sense she accepts love even with all the services it cannot give, she lets her lover know that she would never even trade his love for peace. Humans hunger and thirst for peace, and the poet making the claim that she wouldn’t even trade love for such a valuable feeling such as peace, gives off the vibe that love really is
If I were asked who the most precious people in my life are, I would undoubtedly answer: my family. They were the people whom I could lean on to matter what happens. Nonetheless, after overhearing my mother demanded a divorce, I could not love her as much as how I loved her once because she had crushed my belief on how perfect life was when I had a family. I felt as if she did not love me anymore. Poets like Philip Levine and Robert Hayden understand this feeling and depict it in their poems “What Work Is” and “Those Winter Sundays.” These poems convey how it feels like to not feel love from the family that should have loved us more than anything in the world. Yet, they also convey the reconciliation that these family members finally reach because the speakers can eventually see love, the fundamental component of every family in the world, which is always presence, indeed. Just like I finally comprehended the reason behind my mother’s decision was to protect me from living in poverty after my father lost his job.
I personally loved everything that this poem stood for. I liked that this poem had two average people at its center. They were not young or insanely beautiful, but they still showed how amazing love can be and how love goes beyond everything. When it comes down to it love has no gender, age, race, or time it is just about humans loving other humans. In this week’s chapter it is discussed how romance itself has a huge cultural impact and this poem definitely connects with this idea. This poem also follows the cliche of love. The way that love is blinding and will conquer all is presented in a real and believable way, but then it can also be considered unrelatable for some because how romance is set up to be and how high the standards are for true love. Furthermore, I like the idea of love going beyond age, beauty, and time but realistically for most people they will never experience a love so intense. People can though understand how what is portrayed in the media is not how everyone experiences love and that people who differ from this unrealistic standard can still be in love in their own intense beautiful way.
Surprisingly, the poem shifts its focus off of love and to a very similar subject, although it has a slightly less favorable connotation: desire. "Tomorrow [is] getting shorter, even as we speak. In this flinty age of materialism we've gorown fond of witches - they embody our with to believe, to immerse ourselves...to be welcomed into imprudence, the elevated tor, unbreakable oath." She seems to be reaching out, saying that people in general have succumbed to materialism, that the ideal of love as it was presented previously was something which is quickly becoming lost to humanity. The people will now turn to "witches," symbolically implying that mankind will follow a false path in the hopes of his own advancement.
“Love Poem With Toast” by Miller Williams introduces the effect our desires have in our daily lives in order to “move, as we call it, forward” (11). Miller Williams also conveys this message accompanied with a darker meaning; though these desires make up a large part of our lives, in the end none of it will matter because we leave the world the same way we enter it, with nothing. Despite this message being carried out, it is still a love poem at the surface, but it is not about a person confessing their love, rather pretending to love, and continuing to live with this self-conflict about choosing to be in a frigid relationship over not being in one at all. It is interesting how Miller rhythmically categorizes his message throughout the poem;
The first six lines of the poem highlight the incompetence of love when compared to the basic supplies for life. Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain; Nor yet a floating spar to men that sink And rise and sink and rise and sink again Love can not fill the thickened lung with breath, Nor clean the blood, nor set the fractured bone; It is quite obvious that the narrator highlights everything that requires living in line 1 through 6. Line 1 depicts the deficiency of love as a thing that is not able to provide food as compared to “meat” (1): love cannot hydrate a man as signified by “drink” (1): love cannot refresh a man as signified by “slumber” (2): it does not offer shelter as signified by “a roof against the rain” (2): love cannot give a preserving “floating spar” to a man who is in peril (3): nor will love give air to a “thickened lung” (5): love cannot “set the fractured bone” (6). The narrator describes love as a worthless element in the first 6 lines, but line 7 and line 8 express a tremendous level of violence that people are willing to commit because of the lack of love: “ Yet many a man is making friends with death / Even as I speak, for lack of love alone” (7-8). Line 7 and line 8 is an evidence to prove that no matter what the poet says about love, people are willing to die for it because it is important.
Both poets want to be loved in the poems in their own way. While both poem’s present a theme of love, it is obvious that the poet’s view on love changes from how they view love at the beginning of the poem from how they see it at the end.
Sappho, who is very well the speaker and author of the poem, clearly recognizes the substantial impact that love creates in relation to the amount of happiness people experience. Those who are successful in the game love, whether it be by giving it or receiving it, are far happier than those who confront despair and rejection. Finding love means finding the acceptance, companionship, and most of all, happiness that everyone strives to receive in their lifetime. As a result, love becomes a weapon for power, superiority, and control.
This is a complex poem. She even began with a complex idea, love. What exactly is love? Is it a feeling, an emotion that no one has control of? Is love something you can feel or touch? Some say it is not something that you can feel or touch, but you are well aware when love touches you, because you can feel it. It is an emotion that causes pleasure and pain. In this poem, Millay is showing how complex love is. The first half is about what love cannot do. Love is not a lifesaver, shelter, or a doctor. The second half is about the power of love. Even though love is not tangible, is it as important as something that is? Millay seems to be coming from the idea that love is not everything, but it is important. A question is raised, is love necessary for survival?
She would rather have a present love that is completely unfathomable than a real love that is not around. The repetition in this poem makes the reader believe this loss is actually causing the speaker to lose her mind, but through changing tones that mirror the emotions anyone would go through in a situation of loss like this, the speaker’s response is completely justified.
Poets often times share their opinions through their poems. It is not always easily understood. Poets use metaphors, similes, and play with their words to show how they feel about a certain situation. In “Sex without Love” by Sharon Olds, a lot of this comes into play.
The Poet wants everyone to not be like this, she expects them to be there for the needy, the helpless, no matter the cost, no matter the odds. And I believe this is the true spirit of human nature.
On the other side, “Love Poem” is very different from the previous poem. This seven stanza poem is based on a man describing the imperfections of his lover. In this, the speaker uses stylistic devices, such as alliteration and personification to impact more on reader, for example as the speaker shows “your lipstick ginning on our coat,”(17) ...
As the poem continues on, the evening is spent. talking about anything but love. The final topic of discussion goes much deeper. than just love. They end up talking about how the world is sometimes so. unpredictable and dark. But they have to both rise above that and always be true and faithful to one another. & nbsp; The "Dover Beach," by Matthew Arnold, is a love poem, but is mostly about the beach.
There are many different themes that can be used to make a poem both successful and memorable. Such is that of the universal theme of love. This theme can be developed throughout a poem through an authors use of form and content. “She Walks in Beauty,” by George Gordon, Lord Byron, is a poem that contains an intriguing form with captivating content. Lord Byron, a nineteenth-century poet, writes this poem through the use of similes and metaphors to describe a beautiful woman. His patterns and rhyme scheme enthrall the reader into the poem. Another poem with the theme of love is John Keats' “La Belle Dame sans Merci,” meaning “the beautiful lady without mercy.” Keats, another nineteenth-century writer, uses progression and compelling language throughout this poem to engage the reader. While both of these poems revolve around the theme of love, they are incongruous to each other in many ways.
The poem begins with a negative view of love, “Love is not all: it is not meat nor drink Nor slumber nor a roof against the rain;” she compares it to essential items such as food, sleep, and shelter (Millay lines 1-2). Millay questions the validity of love, and its purpose and place in life. If something is not needed, is it important? At this point in the poem, it is very clear that Millay does not feel love as being essential to her life. She even states that love is not a floating spar; it will not help drowning men nor help anyone survive, because it is just an emotion. This theme that love cannot save you from