“’Hope’ is the thing with feathers-“ by Emily Dickinson, “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost, and “Perhaps the World Ends Here” by Joy Harjo, are all poems that use symbols to represent their intended meaning. Each poem also uses literary devices to add some spice and interest to the poem. Symbols and literary devices are both used to represent the themes present in each poem. The biographical information of each author strongly influences the style in which they write and the themes of their poems.
Many poets use symbols to create illusions and to give the reader an object to make the concept easier to understand. “’Hope’ is the thing with feathers-” by Emily Dickinson compares hope to a bird. By reading the first stanza of the poem, the reader will realize hope is a thing with feathers, but it does not state specifically what the certain thing actually is (Dickinson 710). According to Leiter, “a “thing with feathers” is not yet a bird, but some sort of object, not easily envisioned and defined only by the fact that it is feathered, that is, winged, capable of flight” (Leiter). As the poem progresses into the second stanza it becomes more obvious that the “thing with feathers” is actually a small bird (Dickinson 710). According to Randall Huff, “The poem seeks to defamiliarize the bird by casting it in the role of indomitable hero, granting it the scope of action and the means of communication (in this case, an image of endurance)…” (Huff).
Similar to how Dickinson uses a bird to represent hope, Robert Frost uses two roads to symbolize choices. Frost begins his poem with the line “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood / And sorry I could not travel both” (Frost 811). Frost makes it clear that the two decisions that lie in fron...
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...places “including posts at the Institute of American Indian Arts and the American Indian Studies Program at the University of California at Los Angeles” (McClinton-Temple). Although Harjo did not start writing poetry until she was 22, Bochynski believes that “Painting had helped Harjo weather the trauma of her early childhood and adolescence; poetry took her one step further, and the woman who was afraid to speak as a child found her voice as a poet (Bochynski).
All three poems has such a great use of symbolism, from a bird to a road to even a kitchen table. These are all used to represent themes that are important in every reader’s life. Life is full of hard choices everybody will eventually have to make, it is full of trials that need a lot of optimism and hope in order to overcome. Life is a precious gift that each of these poets understand on such a deep level.
Although primarily known as a poet, Harjo conceives of herself as a visual artist. She left Oklahoma at age 16 to attend the Institute of American Indian Arts in Santa Fe, New Mexico, originally studying painting. After attending a reading by poet Simon Ortiz, she changed her major to poetry. At 17, she returned to Oklahoma to give birth to her son, Phil Dayn, walking four blocks while in labor to the Indian hospital in Talequah. Her daughter, Rainy Dawn, was born four years later in Albuquerque. For years, Harjo supported herself and her children with a variety of jobs: waitress, service-station attendant, hospital janitor, nurse’s assistant, dance teacher. She then went on to earn a B.A. in English from the University of New Mexico in 1976 and an M.F.A. in poetry from the University of Iowa’s famed Iowa Writer’s Workshop in 1978. She then went on to an impressive list of teaching positions beginning with the Institute of American Indian Arts and ending with her current position with the American Indian Studies Program at the University of California at Los Angeles.
“Crazy Brave” is the story of how Harjo survived abandonment and abuse, the temptations of alcohol, and youthful struggles with failed marriages and single motherhood to become one of the most successful Native American poets. Crazy Brave highlights the earliest parts of her life through her early 20s as she grew up in Oklahoma. She had given birth to two children, but cared for three. The story explains the difficulty and struggle with periods of respite. The larger moral of the story is how she faced the survival of spirituality and creativity in the face of generations of dispossession, racism, and familial dysfunction.
The author use personification in the poem because he sees but things will be easier to explain if he uses figurative language. The metaphor comparing to things without using like or as like when she said in the poem ´´ Big ghost in a cloud´ ´ She used metaphor to give a better example of what she sees and what she sees Is cloud shaped as different animals or anything but in the poem she pretty much-seen cloud shaped as the ghost.
In English literature symbolism has been used to offer readers an extensive and open minded meaning for simple words. “A symbol is a word, phrase or, other expression having the complex of associated meaning; in this sense, a symbol is viewed different from those as whatever being symbolized” (Fadaee 19). Tony Morrison in Song of Solomon uses symbols such as peacock, geography book, cave, eggs, ginger smell, darkness, and flying to add more depth and sense to the story. Using these symbols does not only extend the meanings of some words, but coverts them into a important tool for thoughtful interpretation.
The central image that Frost presents, which is the path, provides a clear picture that the reader can focus on in order to reveal something about the poem. The “two roads diverged in a yellow wood'; vividly portray the fact that it is always difficult to make a decision because it is impossible not to wonder about the opportunity that will be missed out on. There is a strong sense of regret before the choice is even made and it lies in the knowledge that in one lifetime, it is impossible to travel down every path that one encounters. In an attempt to make a decision, the traveler "looks down one as far as I could." The road that will be chosen leads to the unknown, as does any choice in life. As much as he may strain his eyes to see how far the road stretches, eventually it surpasses his vision and he can never see where it is going to lead. It is the path that he chooses that sets him off on his journey and determines where he is going and what he will encounter.
In his poem “The Road Not Taken”, Robert Frost discusses the theme of choice. The speaker of the poem finds himself standing in front of two roads diverging in a wood. He is in the process of decision-making for quite a while until he finally takes one of the roads. Now, he spends his time thinking over the choice he made and how he will relate to this choice in the future. To effectively convey the uncertainty of decision-making, Frost develops ambiguity and uses nature imagery in the poem.
Her work is also deeply connected with politics and tradition, especially in American society. Harjo’s poetry explores truths shared by everyone and blends elements from her indigenous culture and many others. The depth in her writing has earned her praise
The overall themes of this poem are beauty, love, and destiny. The speaker constantly discusses beautiful things and how they can help us. Love can be felt throughout the entire poem. In the first stanza, the speaker verbalizes how he “came with love of the race.” He also expresses love for the beautiful things around him. The theme destiny can be seen in the third stanza when the speaker talks about staying on course. It can also be identified in the last stanza when he describes something inevitable that was about to
the poet is trying to portray the fragility of a life, as it is created with the intent to be lost (death
“Hope” has extended metaphor which causes the reader to think of a deeper meaning. The extended metaphor in “Hope” is saying hope is equal to a bird. The reason that the poet used an extended metaphor is because it is more complex to figure out the meaning of the poem. Dickinson not only used metaphors in “Hope” but also in “The Moon” in order to make the reader think of a deeper meaning. The extended metaphor in “The Moon” is about loving what you have and not take things for granted. The reason that the poet used an extended metaphor is to try and make the reader think about what the poet actually means. In conclusion Dickinson uses a lot of extended metaphors in order to make the reader think about the poet's actual meaning.
“Two roads diverged in a yellow wood and sorry I could not travel both and be one traveler” (Page 756 Stanza 1). This is the beginning of an iambic tetrameter by Robert Frost in which he expresses the thoughts of the speaker as they come to a fork in the road. The speaker faces a dilemma of deciding which path to take. Frost uses a closed form with a rhyme scheme of “ABAAB.” The speaker reaching the fork in the road is symbolism for a particular decision that he must make in life. The first stanza is setting up the situation in which the speaker must observe both choices and make a decision and stick with it. This poem allows the reader to use their imagination and is also relatable in everyone’s everyday lives. In “The Road Not Taken,” Robert Frost uses a good rhyme scheme, description, and symbolism to describe an important life decision as well as show the thoughts of the speaker as he makes this decision.
Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s “A Psalm of Life” is an encouraging poem in which Longfellow has utilized many different poetic elements including imagery, rhyme, metaphor, simile and others. The poem is very easy to understand and is engaging to the reader because of the images the poem invokes. Of all of the elements used, imagery is the most consistent and prevalent poetic element in the poem “A Psalm of Life”. Using imagery, Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem describes a life not fully lived, how to live and what a life fully lived looks like.
The two roads presented in this poem represent difficult decisions we are faced with in life. He uses the relationship between the paths and real life decisions throughout the whole poem. This is an example of extended metaphor, which is used to help the readers understand the analogy between the two. The man in the poem said: “long I stood” (3), which lets us know the decision was not made instantly. It was hard for the man to make a final judgment.
One of Robert Frost’s most well known poems is The Road Not Taken. Frost had mentioned numerous times that it was a “tricky- very tricky” poem (Grimes). This can be examined in the structure of the poem, the symbolism, and the diction. The simple language he uses in the poem reveals the common relevance of the poem to the people. People have to go about making choices each and every day of their lives. However, sometimes we come to a cross-road in our lives that can be life changing that is what the sentence structure reveals to us (Mcintyre). He uses common words but in a way that is unclear to the reader. For example the opening line of the poem is “two roads diverged in a yellow wood” (Frost, Robert. “1.”). The reader is not sure what is meant by yellow woods. It may mean the onset of fall or even the coming of spring. The season could relate to the speakers stage in life. It may mean this is their youth and they have to make a decision that will plan out the rest of their life, such as I am about what college to attend. Or is it indicating he has reached his mid-life, the fall, and is now presented with opportunity to change his...
Perhaps one of the most well-known poems in modern America is a work by Robert Frost, The Road Not Taken. This poem consists of four stanzas that depict the story of the narrator traveling through the woods early in the morning and coming upon a fork in the path, where he milled about for a while before deciding upon one of the two paths, wishing he could take both, but knowing otherwise, seeing himself telling of this experience in the future.