Butterflies Amidst Cemeteries The black, rusted gate towers over me, prone to toppling over at the slightest breeze. It creaks as I force it open, rust coating my hands as the gate howls in pain. The smell of stale dirt and rotting carcasses invades my nose as I tentatively creep forward. CRUNCH!. Stranded branches and crumbling, dead leaves grind into the floor under my foot, echoing like gunshots in the dead of night. Winter always viscously murders thriving plants without remorse, but this year the season took it to an extreme. Gnarled hands of naked bark nag at my clothes and hair, desperately grasping for a brush of warmth and life. Never ending mounds of dirt stretch in every direction; an eerie labyrinth growing infinitely larger at …show more content…
My mind freezes as my lips part in astonishment. “Impossible,” I balk in disbelief, eyes wide in surprise. “Mariah Elizabeth Smith,” it reads, letters newly carved and stone freshly polished. The name of my mother. Overcoming my initial shock, I rushed towards her grave. My knees give out and sink into the soil, the mushy dirt pressing into my legs and coating my shoes. I reach my hands up to cover my mouth in surprise, but find my eyes overflowing with water. Tears trail down my cheeks and wetness coats my face as a sob rackets my body. I sniffle, only to inhale the recently shoveled soil and cry harder. Emotions I suppressed deep down inside of me, keeping them trapped in a buried, locked off chest, have managed to escape my control and unlock themselves. As I bluster and weep and make a fool of myself, I feel a light touch on my shoulder. I turn my head to the right, and through my teary eyes, I can barely make out a monarch butterfly. “No,” I gasped in realization. The butterfly is identical to my mother’s tattoo, down to the three spots on its left wing. Every time I looked up at my mother, that exact monarch butterfly would gaze at me from her
“I probably would not have noticed it at all had not a butterfly, a yellow butterfly with dark spots like ink dots on its wings, not lit there. What had brought it there? …I watched it fly over the ditch and down into the quarter, I watched it until I could not see it anymore. Yes, I told myself. It is finally over.”
I walked into the room on New Year’s Day and felt a sudden twinge of fear. My eyes already hurt from the tears I had shed and those tears would not stop even then the last viewing before we had to leave. She lay quietly on the bed with her face as void of emotion as a sheet of paper without the writing. Slowly, I approached the cold lifeless form that was once my mother and gave her a goodbye kiss.
“Westley’’ announced Buttercup. ‘’Do you ever think about being king?’’ ‘’No not really.’’ He whispered ‘’Why?’’ As they both lay in their beds as the quietness of the night, grew upon them . ’’
We’re halfway through the show and we’re about to sing “Little Things” and I get this idea. “To make this song even more special, we’ll each pick one of you to come up here with us.” After I finish the room goes insane and the lads look confused. So the band starts to play and we begin to look. Zayn and Harry were the first to find their girls in the first row, but Louis, Liam, and I took our time. This was my perfect move to find her and I know where she sits. When I was holding those small hands her bracelet said “Row K Seat 3”, so that’s where I’m looking. “Niall what’s taking so long it’s not like you’re looking for the one.” Harry joked and the crowd went wild. But I am, there’s something about her that makes me crazy. “I found her.” I reach out for
This poem 's expressive purpose is to show how detrimental jealousy can be. This poem shows how the duke was overtaken by his desire to control the duchess and became overtaken by insecurity, jealousy, and egotistical feelings. This poem shows how one can be driven by greed and jealousy to commit atrocities. The direct purpose of the duke 's monologue is to act as a warning to the representative of the count so that the duke would not marry another woman like his "last duchess". However, the poem 's influence extends father than this and readers can see Browning 's commentary on love, power, greed, and art.
Six years ago, My Mom, Dad, Sister and I started fostering a kitten named Buttercup, then named her Stella after we adopted her. Buttercup was her old name, along with her sister Butterscotch and brother Butterball. My family and I loved Stella. Stella is my version of a living treasure, even with her flaws I wouldn’t change anything about her. She's sweet, loving, and gives me someone to talk to who doesn’t criticize. She was my world, and still is. Stella has pure vanilla white hair, chocolatey-brown spots, and yellow eyes like sunflowers. Now she is six years old and I hope she stays with me for a long time. I’ll tell this story starting at the beginning at my house in Atlanta, Georgia, the place where I grew up.
I looked at myself in the mirror. I noticed the lines of my face and the curve of my neck. I looked down at my hands remembering the moment I first realized that they looked like hers. Long, thin, delicate hands perfect for playing the piano or braiding cornrows. All my life I had not noticed until the day I sat at her bedside holding her hand in mine. She had told me that she was not afraid to die. We sat in silence for a long time, sometimes sharing a stare and a smile. I don't know how long I sat there, looking at her, realizing for the first time who I looked so much like. As I stood in front of the mirror, I remembered that day as I prepared for her funeral. Sarah Smith, my grandmother's going home day. My father asked me to do her eulogy. I had thought and thought of what to say. The words didn't come until the morning of her funeral. That morning I went to the lake where me, my brothers, and my sister would go swimming in the summer on weekend visits to my grandmother's. As I soaked in the sun and watched its rays dance on the waters a memory came.
I walk into the house, Dad is on the phone. I am just getting home from an amazing time at my friend Dimitri’s house. I look at my dad’s face and notice something is wrong, he looks up at me and makes throat cut motion; “Torae is dead”. Daniel, my best friend in the world, fell in love with an older woman. I accepted that just like everyone else, we couldn’t change his mind and there was no proof of statchitory rape. She was pregnant at the time of her death, and I’m afraid I’m going to get a call telling me Daniel has taken his life as well. That call doesn’t transpire. Two weeks have gone by; school is starting a couple of days. There is commotion in the living room, and ten minutes later, we rush to the emergency vet and beg for them to save our dog’s life, they only care about money and won’t help. I can see the desperation in my Dads eyes and hear the pleading in my mom’s voice on the phone. I already know what’s going to happen, I’ve accepted it. A lot of crying, but it’s my call whether we try to let Ruby make it through the night, and I say no. My mom had to say bye at work. And as we drive home, Ruby is whining in pain and her eyes have glossed over. We arrive home and I wait, and wait, for the ring of the gunshot. I start digging, anger, sadness, grief; it’s all going into that shovel. There is a plan of growing a peach tree, in the location of her burial. She was our oldest animal from Oregon, and now she is
There she is. I could set my watch by her on the off chance that I had one. Same rec center. Same time. Same workout.
In Virginia Woolf’s story “The Death of the Moth,” the constant struggle between life and death is thoroughly laid out as a battle that will never, in the end, be won. Woolf concludes, "death is stronger than I am." to strongly prove that death will always be stronger than hope. Virginia describes what she sees outside of her window to depict the simplicity of life beyond her room. She explains the excitement of the rooks in the treetops and believed that the horses and men shared the same energy in which the moths patheticness has restricted itself. Woolf feels that she can connect to the moth in the sense that she too, is pathetic which is why she creates so much emotion towards it. Woolf feels that the moth is acting upon the energy of the outdoors however, it flies into the corners struggling to get out. The moth, anxious as can be “flew vigorously to one corner... fluttering from side to side”. Woolf’s choice of imagery for this piece creates a very personal feel as the reader can sit in Virginia’s place to visualize the struggle of the moth. Woolf attempted to save the moth as it struggled long and hard until she realized that death will always be the outcome. As the moth grasps for one last breath, she depicts her indifference through the phrase “I laid the pencil down,” as if she had given up on hope for
Kneeling down, he runs a finger along one rose, the blossom still curling with life. Pale petals drenched in dew, leaves like wax, thorns jagged and defiant. His eyes search the grave for a trace of this new intruder. He is curious but miffed; he had believed himself to be the only visitor here. He felt a sense of belonging with the grave, as though his own name should be scrawled beneath that of the deceased.
As we read Virginia Woolf’s somber yet fascinating short story The Death of the Moth, it is quickly realized this is about her personal struggle with depression. The moth itself is the very symbol of her hope to not diminish in this interesting life. Woolf intricately compares the moth’s futile attempts to what seems to be minute problems, but are quite possibly some of the most challenging moments in her life. Woolf mentions such a small detail, “As often as he crossed the pane, I could fancy that a thread of vital light became visible” (Woolf, 2).
The day of brother and sister night dance at Faith’s elementary school is where it all went pandemonium. I, Jayvion, woke up in bed and got up to dress in my suit and tie. I took a shower and did my hair to look impeccable for the dance. I ambled into the kitchen and saw my ostentatious little sister waiting for me. My mother, Feanika, walks in as she comes from work as a waitress.
Charles Hamilton Sorley was born in Aberdeen, Scotland (Scottish Poetry Library). The son of William Ritchie Sorley, a professor of moral philosophy, Sorley was an academically gifted child (Poetry Foundation).The family moved to Cambridge when he was five, and Sorley attended King’s College choir school as well as Marlborough College with some study in Germany (Britannica). He began publishing poetry in the school journal and won a scholarship to Oxford University (Poetry Foundation). Sorley was in Germany when World War I broke out and was interred for one night in prison at Trier, Germany (Irish Times). Making his way back to England, he enlisted in the army and served in the trenches of France (Scottish Poetry Foundation).
When discussing the poetic form of dramatic monologue it is rare that it is not associated with and its usage attributed to the poet Robert Browning. Robert Browning has been considered the master of the dramatic monologue. Although some critics are skeptical of his invention of the form, for dramatic monologue is evidenced in poetry preceding Browning, it is believed that his extensive and varied use of the dramatic monologue has significantly contributed to the form and has had an enormous impact on modern poetry. "The dramatic monologues of Robert Browning represent the most significant use of the form in postromantic poetry" (Preminger and Brogan 799). The dramatic monologue as we understand it today "is a lyric poem in which the speaker addresses a silent listener, revealing himself in the context of a dramatic situation" (Murfin 97). "The character is speaking to an identifiable but silent listener at a dramatic moment in the speaker's life. The circumstances surrounding the conversation, one side which we "hear" as the dramatic monologue, are made by clear implication, and an insight into the character of the speaker may result" (Holman and Harmon 152).