The poem, “The Black Snake” by Mary Oliver is about a person that witnessed a truck running over a snake in the road and killing it. After she moves the snake to the bushes she beings to think about death and how sudden it can be. I enjoyed reading this poem because she explained the feelings of death and how unexpected it can be. This free verse poem’s use of metaphors and similes were an amusing and interesting way to describe death. Lastly, I enjoyed how the theme of the poem was portrayed by the snake and the event that ended its life. The author was able to depict that life is unpredictable and so is death through the use of literary terms.
The first and most common literary term Mary Oliver used was symbolism. In the poem, the snake
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“The Black Snake” was written as a free verse poem. It does not rhyme and the only structure that the poem has to it is that there are six stanzas that all consist of four lines. I believe that Mary Oliver wrote this poem as a free verse to aid to the meaning that not many things in life can actually be planned. For example, a person can plan a night out with friends and go bowling. They have a plan in mind, but, on the way to the bowling alley someone hits their car and someone gets seriously hurt. They were able to plan what they were doing for the night, but, they couldn’t plan for the car accident. The author not only show that meaning through her form but also in the words. She wrote about a truck driving down the road and a snake “flashed into the road” and the truck couldn’t move in time. The snake didn’t want to die and the person driving the truck probably didn’t plan on hitting a snake that …show more content…
Therefore, the next literary term found in this poem was imagery. When Mary was describing the accident I was able to picture a road with bushes and grass on either side and a truck in front. Then I could picture the snake jumping into the road really fast when she said, “when the black snake flashed onto the morning road” and the truck maybe swerving a little bit but not being able to spare the life of the snake. After that I pictured snake lying there in a circle and the woman pulling her car over, picking up the snake when Mary said, “now he lies looped and useless as an old bicycle tire” and moving it onto the grass. She used brief sentences and words to describe the event, but, I was able to see it in my head
There are multiple examples of visual imagery in this poem. An example of a simile is “curled like a possum within the hollow trunk”. The effect this has is the way it creates an image for the reader to see how the man is sleeping. An example of personification is, “yet both belonged to the bush, and now are one”. The result this has is how it creates an emotion for the reader to feel
Mary Oliver was a famous poet and nature-lover, she used nature as center of her poetries. She was observant and thoughtful, which endowed her poetry a unique charm and depth. In her poem “The Black Snake” also manifests everything in the natural world is equal. This poem narrated that the speaker found a black snake was killed by a truck and thus to start thinking death and life. Meanwhile, Mary’s poetic language also has strong power. This poetry is a simplicity and short but she used many elements of poetry to make this poetry more profound and meaningful, and the symbolism and figures of speech are the two main element in “The Black Snake”. Figures of speech brings value
Nature is a universal concept that nearly everyone on the planet can relate to, as well as the struggle of not knowing one’s place in the world, both of which are central themes in Mary Oliver’s poem. For example, in the opening lines of her piece Mary Oliver urges her readers not to feel guilt or shame for how he/she may be feeling via metaphors from nature, “You only have to let the soft animal of your body love what it loves.” (Lines 4-5) She also utilizes nature to create beautiful imagery for her readers. These images not only add to the splendor of the poem but are part of her purpose as well. An example of this is Lines 8 through 11, in these lines Oliver writes out, “Meanwhile the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain are moving across the landscapes, over the prairies and the deep trees, the mountains and the rivers…” By using these examples and symbols from nature Oliver helps to communicate her message, which is that every person on the planet has the right to be comfortable in his/her own skin. When the author uses these techniques she is able to harness the pathos technique to convince her reader that she is correct in her statement within the
Imagery is made up of the five senses, which are sight, hearing, touch, smell, and taste. The first sense of sight is seen throughout the whole poem, specifically in the first two lines, “I had the idea of sitting still/while others rushed by.” This sight she envisions is so calm and still and the perfect example of appreciating the little things that life has to offer. Through the use of these terse statements, she allows it to have more meaning than some novels do as a whole.
Imagery is used to show the reader, what the setting around her is like. The author uses descriptive language that appeals to the sense of sight. The author describes her memory as being in " the shining town". Also, "on the sulphur-yellow beaches". The author describes the "shining town" and the "yellow beaches" because the sun was probably setting and made everything look pretty. Later on in the poem, the author describes the moon as being, "hung above us like a golden mango". This tells the readers that in that moment there was only light on her and who she was with and that she felt like the only thing important at that moment in time. Through these examples of imagery, the reader was able to tell where and how she felt when she was with her person.
Imagery is when the author uses detail to paint a picture of what’s happening. This is shown when Kendra is looking out of the window, “...fixed her gaze on a particular tree, following it as it slowly approached, streaked past, and then gradually receded behind her..” (1). This is imagery because you can imagine the tree flying past. These literary devices help deepen the plot of the
Imagery is one of the components that were used by Edwards to make his story more persuasive. As the short story begins, the first sentence was an example of imagery. Edwards wrote when men are on Gods hands and they could fall to hell. natural men are held in the hands of God, over the pit of hell Knowing that you might fall into hell at any moment should scare you. God decided to save you until he wants to let you fall into an eternity of burning flames. Another example of imagery is when he talks abo...
In literature, themes shape and characterize an author’s writing making each work unique as different points of view are expressed within a writing’s words and sentences. This is the case, for example, of Edgar Allan Poe’s poem “Annabel Lee” and Emily Dickinson’s poem “Because I could not stop for Death.” Both poems focus on the same theme of death, but while Poe’s poem reflects that death is an atrocious event because of the suffering and struggle that it provokes, Dickinson’s poem reflects that death is humane and that it should not be feared as it is inevitable. The two poems have both similarities and differences, and the themes and characteristics of each poem can be explained by the author’s influences and lives.
Imagery is when the author presents a mental image through descriptive words. One prime example of imagery that the author uses is in paragraph 3; where she tells of a moment between a man and a woman. In this narration she states the time, year, outfit of each character described, and what the female character was doing. These details might come across as irrelevant, or unnecessary, but this is Didions way of showing what the blueprint of notebook it. Using imagery reinforces the foundation of the essay, and what the essay’s mission was.
Therefore, Oliver’s incorporation of imagery, setting, and mood to control the perspective of her own poem, as well as to further build the contrast she establishes through the speaker, serves a critical role in creating the lesson of the work. Oliver’s poem essentially gives the poet an ultimatum; either he can go to the “cave behind all that / jubilation” (10-11) produced by a waterfall to “drip with despair” (14) without disturbing the world with his misery, or, instead, he can mimic the thrush who sings its poetry from a “green branch” (15) on which the “passing foil of the water” (16) gently brushes its feathers. The contrast between these two images is quite pronounced, and the intention of such description is to persuade the audience by setting their mood towards the two poets to match that of the speaker. The most apparent difference between these two depictions is the gracelessness of the first versus the gracefulness of the second. Within the poem’s content, the setting has been skillfully intertwined with both imagery and mood to create an understanding of the two poets, whose surroundings characterize them. The poet stands alone in a cave “to cry aloud for [his] / mistakes” while the thrush shares its beautiful and lovely music with the world (1-2). As such, the overall function of these three elements within the poem is to portray the
In the story Gabriel starts off by describing how he is layed next to her, the way he feels. Imagery is used in the story, because every single word or sentence you read can be pictured perfectly in your mind. “She was fast asleep”, that is an example of imagery because automatically you can picture Gabriel’s wife laying down and figuring out she has past away. Another example is “walk along the river in the snow” you picture the person walking on the snow down the river. The “black sneakers” are in the beginning of the story described very well
Words possess many different meanings. The context of the sentence and how the words are used help to create an experience in the reader. In Mary Oliver's, The Honey Tree, she structures her poem in a way that punctuates on the action in the text. Oliver uses the multiple meanings of words to help create a more vivid picture.
In Mary Oliver’s poem “The Black Snake,” the narrator contemplates the cycle of life with the unpredictability of death. Mary Oliver’s work is “known for its natural themes and a continual affirmation of nature as a place of mystery and spirituality that holds the power to teach humans how to value one’s life and one’s place” (Riley). In the poem, The Black Snake, the narrator witnesses a black snake hit by a truck and killed on a road one morning. Feeling sympathy for the snake, the narrator stops, and removes the dead snake from the road. Noting the snake’s beauty, the narrator carries it from the road to some nearby bushes. Continuing to drive, the narrator reflects on how the abruptness of death ultimately revealed how the snake lived his life.
Another rhetorical strategy incorporated in the poem is imagery. There are many types of images that are in this poem. For example, the story that the young girl shares with the boy about drowning the cat is full of images for the reader to see:
Whitman chose a bird and Oliver chose the black snake. In literature, birds are used to represent freedom, something positive, or transition. “They represent the human desire to escape gravity, to reach the level of the angel. The bird is often the disembodied human soul, free of its physical constrictions” (Birds). Whitman uses the bird to represent the transition of the death of the self to the birth of a poet. The boy is free to be a poet, which is what his soul was always destined to be. In literature, snakes are used to represent fertility, a creative life force, rebirth, transformation, immortality, healing, temptation, chaos or something negative. In literature, the color black is used to represent evil, fear, death, or something negative. Oliver used the black snake because most people are scared of snakes; most people wouldn’t care to stop their car to pick up a snake on the road and bring it to safety like they would with deer, cats, or dogs. Oliver wanted the reader to realize that a person should always treat anything and everything with care, love, and compassion no matter what or who it is and no matter how good or bad it is thought to be. Oliver wanted people to realize that all life is sacred. The second difference between Whitman and Oliver’s poems is how the characters came to an epiphany surrounding death. In Out of the Cradle Endlessly Rocking, the boy doesn’t initially have an epiphany surrounding death after the bird disappears and never returns; he finally gets an epiphany when the sea whispers something to him, “Delaying not, hurrying not, Whisper’d me through the night, and very plainly before daybreak, Lisp’d to me the low and delicious word death” (Whitman 76). In The Black Snake, the narrator has an epiphany surrounding death the moment the snake dies and they drive away; they didn’t need to have something else show or