The two main themes explored in In the Attic and Stop the clocks are
love and loss
The two main themes explored in 'In the Attic' and 'Stop the clocks'
are love and loss. Both poets express their insight into the knowledge
that the world will not stop regardless of the loss of mankind. This,
however, is where the similarity ends. Both writers are expressing
their own personal way of dealing with losing someone close to them.
On Auden's side, there is bitterness in his loss, and an almost gothic
romanticism of Bronte's writing despite its modern edge. With Motions
however, there is more of stoicism in the writing. He writes so that
we know there has been a great loss on his part, but this poem is not
of the melodramatic substance, which Auden's is. Motions poem is a
quiet resignation to the fact that a loved one has been lost. It has
in its core, a nostalgic romanticism and sense of regret. It has in
its essence a nostalgic romanticism and regret likened to that of
Thomas Hardy's poetry. It is these two differences in writing style
that I intend to explore.
Stop the Clocks is a poem that describes a person’s loss and the
deepness in which they suffer from their absence. Everything that
happens around them feels as though it is ending, the clocks, and the
telephones should all be stopped as in the same way that a life has
stopped. Also as he says ‘Silence the pianos and with muffled drum,
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come’ it is as if they want the
world to know what has happened to the poet, and that everybody should
feel some pain like the pain Auden feels right now. The same is
represented in the lines ‘Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead,
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead’, it’s the desire that
everybody should know that Auden is in mourning and that nothing is
going to change how he feels, should someone attempt to help him then
he will simply send every message the same, I Mourn. The fourth verse
is amplifying what a person meant to Auden. ‘He was my North, my
South, my East and West’ this shows how much of an impact a person has
had on Auden, so much of an impact that they became everything to
them. The poet makes it sound as though now that person is dead, there
is no more north, south, east or west to them and that there could
never be again. ‘My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song’ this is as
My initial response to the poem was a deep sense of empathy. This indicated to me the way the man’s body was treated after he had passed. I felt sorry for him as the poet created the strong feeling that he had a lonely life. It told us how his body became a part of the land and how he added something to the land around him after he died.
“Pass On” written by Michael Lee is a free verse poem informing readers on grief, which is one of the most difficult obstacles to overcome not only when losing a loved one, but also in life itself. “Pass On” successfully developed this topic through the setting of an unknown character who explains his or her experience of grief. Despite Lee never introducing this character, readers are given enough information to know how they are overcoming this difficult obstacle. In fact, this unknown character is most likely the writer himself, indirectly explaining his moments of grief. One important piece of information Lee provides is the fact that he has experienced loss twice, one with his grandfather and the other a friend who was murdered by the
This poem reflects on how when you lose someone you truly care about it affects you mentally. When we lose someone who we're really close to, we tend to hold a grudge and start questioning our love for the world. We lose ourselves when we
The funeral was supposed to be a family affair. She had not wanted to invite so many people, most of them strangers to her, to be there at the moment she said goodbye. Yet, she was not the only person who had a right to his last moments above the earth, it seemed. Everyone, from the family who knew nothing of the anguish he had suffered in his last years, to the colleagues who saw him every day but hadn’t actually seen him, to the long-lost friends and passing acquaintances who were surprised to find that he was married, let alone dead, wanted to have a last chance to gaze upon him in his open coffin and say goodbye.
Last but not least the Vietnam War Poem told us about the sadness that the war caused
Everyone copes with grief in his or her own ways. Tracy K. Smith, the poet laureate of the United States and
... wars and deaths of loved ones, or like those in a Greek tragedy, but the writer of this poem is so sincerely affected by sorrow and tragedy that it permeates his daily life, to the point where the death of a toad during the mowing of a lawn is seen as something moving and serious.
... bruised by the poor reception of his poetry. The realizations that we all "must die", and that attempts to attain immortality through art are in vain, leave this sonnet with a lasting and overriding sense of despair.
In Funeral Rites, Heaney portrays various attitudes towards death, which are amplified in North as a collection, through its distinct, tri-partite structure. In the first section, Heaney concentrates on his admiration of the ceremony he experienced attending funerals in the past.The transition from past tense to present is confirmed by the strong adverb ‘Now’, and lines 33-39 focus on The Troubles plaguing Northern Ireland since the 1960s. Future tense beginning on line 40 addresses Heaney’s hope for the future, emphasizing the current lack of ritual.
The concept of loss is a notable theme in poetry, whether its about love, beauty or even
... be casting stones, or holding a conversation. The speaker of the poem does not move on from this emotional torment, yet I do feel as if in his quest for closure he does resolve some of the tumultuous feelings he does have in regard to losing his love.
...when they lose someone dear to them. However, we need to make the distinction that his words do not dictate how everyone should feel when coping with a loss.
The speaker started the poem by desiring the privilege of death through the use of similes, metaphors, and several other forms of language. As the events progress, the speaker gradually changes their mind because of the many complications that death evokes. The speaker is discontent because of human nature; the searching for something better, although there is none. The use of language throughout this poem emphasized these emotions, and allowed the reader the opportunity to understand what the speaker felt.
Funeral Blues by W. H. Auden is a short poem that illustrates the emotions that he is dealing with after the love of his life passes away. The tone of this piece evokes feelings that will differ depending on the reader; therefore, the meaning of this poem is not in any way one-dimensional, resulting in inevitable ambiguity . In order to evoke emotion from his audience, Auden uses a series of different poetic devices to express the sadness and despair of losing a loved one. This poem isn’t necessarily about finding meaning or coming to some overwhelming realization, but rather about feeling emotions and understanding the pain that the speaker is experiencing. Through the use of poetic devices such as an elegy, hyperboles, imagery, metaphors, and alliterations as well as end-rhyme, Auden has created a powerful poem that accurately depicts the emotions a person will often feel when the love of their live has passed away.
Losing a loved one is one of the hardest experiences every person must go through. The experience does not end with the loss though, but begins with it. The loss of a dear person leads those left behind into a downward spiral of emotions and memories. A poem entitled “Lucy Gray” by William Wordsworth focuses on that loss and the emotions that follow it. By reading the poem one can objectively experience both the grief that Lucy Gray’s death brings on but also her parents’ acceptance of her death.