Li Po can be described in many ways. Many also know him by the name of Li Bai. There is a lot to be learned and said of Li Po. Some of which are good and in other ways, not so much. For example, he was a drunk, which had led to his suicide. “Li Bai drowned attempting to embrace the moons reflection in the river” (Hunter). Another way which can indicate that the poet seemed like a distressed man, despite being known as the great poet that many say he was are in this way as well, he was married four different times to four different women. More information about his life was during the time of the Tang Dynasty, living from 701-762, which made his sixty-one years of age when he passed. Ironically enough. all of these flaws seemed to disappear …show more content…
The first poem, Alone and Drinking Under the Moon, had one main theme, “encompasses several of the characteristics that define Li Po. As a devotee to nature, wine, solitude and humor”. (G. K Fralin). Which after researching came to this conclusion. The theme is “time”. Proving this, Li Po writes that “in the time of happiness”, and “I sit and sing” (Hunter lines 13,15). Showing the readers that as he is offering the moon some wine, he waits to be accompanied by the moon to share his wine as well as befriending the moon. As he is drinking, it seems as though no time is passing because he waits and waits for the moon to come and drink with him, until he decides that he will make his wine class the moon, so in fact he can actually drink with the …show more content…
For example, “Amongst the flowers”, “Then I dance” “I too must be happy”, “I hope that one day we three will meet again” (Li Hunter). A strong case can easily be, made that these other themes could in fact be the main one throughout this particular poem. Main point being though, is that it is possible to have more than one theme in poetry, particularly in Li Po’s poetry and could be interpreted in many other ways than one. It is imperative to keep an open mind while reading poetry and criticizing any opinions the reader may have about the poem. “Autumn River Song”, is a beautiful, yet very short poem. It is being only four stanzas long but captures what poetry is all about. Though it may be short the poem is very effective to how the reader may interpret it. “The moon simmers in green water. White herons fly through the moonlight. The young man hears a girl gathering water-chestnuts: into the night, singing, they paddle home together” (Li Po). Now, after not knowing too much about the white herons, research was crucial to help me as a scholar to interpret this
The purpose of the poem was to express my interests of nature and how I felt and what I experienced when I was in the woods at that time. There’s also that life and death aspect in this poem, in which the bird has the lizard in his mouth and also by the word “fire”.
...e the heron both literally and figuratively add to the sense of wonder in the tone of the passage. In the poem by Mary Oliver, the diction used to describe the heron is completely different. The words "gray", "hunched", "clutching", and "scant" give the poem a desperate, unpredictable view of nature. The tone is dreary, begrudging, and almost helpless. Diction truly can take hold of the tone of a work and steer it in whatever direction it wishes.
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
Therefore, one can see that these poems although similar in their title and central image of the star differ in their themes, form and treatment of the author's ideas.
The Civil War split the nation in half. It tore apart families, and Union soldiers against Confederate soldiers for four miserable years. From the first shots fired at Fort Sumter 1861, and ending with a unanimous Confederate victory in 1865. All in all 630,000 people died and many thousands wounded. The deaths in the Civil War totally surpassed the death totals from any other war (1). For those managed to survive the up hill battle just began, they faced many unknowns in a world moving in an uncertain direction. With the north beating the succeeded south in the war, politicians faced a hard task of reuniting the divided country. With reconstruction now in affect, both northern workers, and southern farmers now face many new obstacles and uncertainties about their jobs. The southern farmers had it bad, they lost the war, lost their slaves, and were forced to move west in order to find new farmland and continue to make a manageable living. However the north and south would find out that they would need each other in order to move the country forward.
For each seasonal section, there is a progression from beginning to end within the season. Each season is compiled in a progressive nature with poetry describing the beginning of a season coming before poetry for the end of the season. This is clear for spring, which starts with, “fallen snow [that] lingers on” and concludes with a poet lamenting that “spring should take its leave” (McCullough 14, 39). The imagery progresses from the end of winter, with snow still lingering around to when the signs of spring are disappearing. Although each poem alone does not show much in terms of the time of the year, when put into the context of other poems a timeline emerges from one season to the next. Each poem is linked to another poem when it comes to the entire anthology. By having each poem put into the context of another, a sense of organization emerges within each section. Every poem contributes to the meaning of a group of poems. The images used are meant to evoke a specific point in each season from the snow to the blossoms to the falling of the blossoms. Since each poem stands alone and has no true plot they lack the significance than if they were put into th...
The poem, “Field of Autumn”, by Laurie Lee exposes the languorous passage of time along with the unavoidability of closure, more precisely; death, by describing a shift of seasons. In six stanzas, with four sentences each, the author also contrasts two different branches of time; past and future. Death and slowness are the main motifs of this literary work, and are efficiently portrayed through the overall assonance of the letter “o”, which helps the reader understand the tranquility of the poem by creating an equally calmed atmosphere. This poem is to be analyzed by stanzas, one per paragraph, with the exception of the third and fourth stanzas, which will be analyzed as one for a better understanding of Lee’s poem.
Each poem describes a scene where a man learns from his experience and interaction with nature. In “The Meadow Mouse” the man instantly finds himself a father-figure to the mouse that he finds. When the mouse leaves, he thinks of the dangers of nature such as, “the turtle gasping in the dusty rubble of the highway.” From his instant love and pain of losing the mouse, he learns how he truly feels about nature. Set in a different scene, the fisherman in “The Fish,...
describes the emptiness of the scenery; “this mountain and I gaze at each other, it alone remaining.” (Hinton, David. Selected Poems Li Po”). As a seasoned traveler, his poems traveled with him throughout many lands. In addition, word of his talent spre...
The title of the poem is very significant. The title penetratingly outlines how precious they view the water to be. He does this by titling the poem ''Blessing''. Water is something which most people take for granted, so by making this the title he emphasizes the value they place upon the water. The poet highlights how much value they place upon the water in the fourth stanza when the pipe bursts by using word choice. ''As their blessings sing'' is the quote from the poem and the effect of this is that it gives you a sense of harmony. The words sum up a peaceful ending for the last two stanzas where the mood of the poem changes from desperation to the contrast of greatfulness. The poet has chosen the phrase ''blessings sing'' as when put together it has conitations of bountful amounts of happiness which accuratly shows their joy and relief they would of felt in that moment of time. I think the poet has used this quote to symbolise the end of a struggle which turned into a celebration and the word ''sing'' to create the passion for the villagers in that moment.
Second of all, in the poem “Lake Isle of Innisfree”, the reader sometimes fails to understand what is really happening. “I will arise and go now, for always night and day I hear lake water...
...a silence deep and white” (Line,4) they are talking about how the white snow is beautiful and, how it looks like to me this is a love of nature to some maybe not.Last one is Intuition over fact in this quote “Father,who makes the snow?” (Line,22) says his daughter, “And told of the good All father” (Line,23) and lastly “Who cares for us here below” (Line,24) he is talking about and all father which i believe he is talking about god,and this is a great characteristic for this poem.
bird as the metaphor of the poem to get the message of the poem across
In “The Negro Speaks of Rivers”, the river stands as a symbol of endlessness, geographical awareness, and the epitome of the human soul. Hughes uses the literary elements of repetition and simile to paint the river as a symbol of timelessness. This is evident in the first two lines of the poem. Hughes introduces this timeless symbol, stating, “I've known rivers: I've known rivers ancient as the world and older than the flow of human blood in human veins” (Hughes 1-2). These opening lines of the poem identifies that the rivers Hughes is speaking about are older than the existence of human life. This indicates the rivers’ qualities of knowledge, permanence, and the ability to endure all. Humans associate “age” with these traits and the longevity of a river makes it a force to be reckoned with. The use of a simile in the line of the poem is to prompt the audience that this is truly a contrast between that ancient wisdom, strength, and determination of the river and the same qualities that characterize a human being. The imagery portrayed in the poem of blood flowing through human veins like a river flows ...
“A Bird came down the Walk,” was written in c. 1862 by Emily Dickinson, who was born in 1830 and died in 1886. This easy to understand and timeless poem provides readers with an understanding of the author’s appreciation for nature. Although the poem continues to be read over one hundred years after it was written, there is little sense of the time period within which it was composed. The title and first line, “A Bird came down the Walk,” describes a common familiar observation, but even more so, it demonstrates how its author’s creative ability and artistic use of words are able to transform this everyday event into a picture that results in an awareness of how the beauty in nature can be found in simple observations. In a step like narrative, the poet illustrates the direct relationship between nature and humans. The verse consists of five stanzas that can be broken up into two sections. In the first section, the bird is eating a worm, takes notice of a human in close proximity and essentially becomes frightened. These three stanzas can easily be swapped around because they, for all intents and purposes, describe three events that are able to occur in any order. Dickinson uses these first three stanzas to establish the tone; the tone is established from the poet’s literal description and her interpretive expression of the bird’s actions. The second section describes the narrator feeding the bird some crumbs, the bird’s response and its departure, which Dickinson uses to elaborately illustrate the bird’s immediate escape. The last two stanzas demonstrate the effect of human interaction on nature and more specifically, this little bird, so these stanzas must remain in the specific order they are presented. Whereas most ...