Poetry immerses us in the lives of others. Compare the ways in which two poets fulfil this purpose. Gwen Harwood and Sylvia Plath immerse the reader in contrasting experiences of motherhood through their respective poems ‘In the Park’ and ‘Morning Song’. In Plath’s poem, the surreal, intimate, and tender experience of early motherhood is explored, as the mother describes how her baby’s “moth-breath” “flickers among the flat pink roses” as a “far sea moves in [her] ear”. This combination of auditory and visual imagery contributes to the poem’s soothing tone, emphasising the mother’s devotion, awe and astonishment for her newborn. Contrasting this maternal adoration, Harwood explores the regret and resentment motherhood can inflict, as the mother …show more content…
Wordsworth explores an admiration of urban environments, whilst Yeats is astonished by nature’s beauty. Wordsworth’s frequent use of hyperbole in statements such as “Never did the sun more beautifully steep” demonstrate his overwhelming adoration and wonder for the city’s beauty. He uses hyperbole to express how, from his perspective, “Earth has not anything to show”. Contrastingly, Yeats establishes a tone of admiration for nature, highlighting the beauty of swans through personification. He describes how the swans’ “hearts have not grown old” as they dabble with “passion or conquest”. The human qualities he bestows on these creatures evokes an emotional connection to the sense of permanence that clashes with the fragility of life, as the birds are “mysterious, beautiful” yet “unwearied still” after nineteen years. Meanwhile, Wordsworth’s irregular and flexible meter creates a more authentic description of the city, expressing his raw, human wonder for its “majesty”, “splendour” and “beauty”. This reflects its diverse structural components realised by “ships, towers, domes, theatres, and temples”. Contrarily, Yeats’ elegantly structured sets create subtle but strong movement throughout, reflecting the powerful movement of swans and the “bell-beat of their wings”. This deliberate use of form contributes to a …show more content…
Dawe presents a bleak outlook on the future world in a disapproving and impassioned tone. Through his use of auditory imagery, where there are “sounds of acceleration instead of birdsong”, he criticises industrialisation and urbanisation, fearing the lack of trees “unless exotica for parking lots” and the impermanence of life after “irreplaceable parts [become] replaceable”. In contrast, Blake explores the confinement of the present, using four quatrains to establish a sense of predictability and repetitiveness. He reflects on the helpless monotony of London, emphasising the uniform nature of urban existence, where everyone’s face has “marks of weakness, marks of woe”. Meanwhile, Dawe’s depressed and melancholy tone reflects on the devolved state of his future world using personification, as “there will be no more streets begging for hopscotch squares”, to starkly present the lack of humanity in the world commanded by “a concrete god”. Furthermore, his employment of euphemism as “little children [go] under the front wheels” highlights the degradation of morality that accompanies an ever-industrialised world, as death is disregarded in a society the oxymoron “Marriage Hearse” juxtaposes the joy of marriage with the misery of death, contributing to the overarching theme of confinement that criticizes the agony “in
...expressed such as in, ‘An impromptu for Ann Jennings’. In this poem Harwood recalls the times that she and a friend experienced during motherhood. She talks of beautiful memories, ‘Nursing…by huge fires of wattle…’ and ends the poem with, ‘to know; our children walk the earth.’ This line is very powerful in that it expresses Harwood’s sheer joy and gratefulness she has for having children and for having a friend to help her along the way. This line becomes imbedded in her audience as its great strength of structure, it opens a window in which some women or mothers can relate and share an un-dividing connection to Harwood’s poems.
The point when considering individual encounters, "The Mother" by Gwendolyn Brooks touches on the frequently passionate theme of premature birth. This sonnet was transformed decades back, yet still remains significant right up 'til the present time. Tolerating premature birth and the conclusion can in fact be a testing undertaking for a lot of people, while others adjust to it without much of an issue. Gwendolyn Brooks, in this great work, permits us to investigate the mom’s perspective purpose of fetus removal via an abortion and how a mother reacts to her interesting circumstance. All around the lyric the speaker hints at distress, using symbolism, concerning the theme of premature birth and its conclusions by exhibiting to us her perspective, memories, love, unpretentious triggers, and disarray.
In American society, the common stereotype is that the father has the role of the dominant figure in the household. Sylvia Plath and Sharon Olds may come across as two seemingly different poets, however, they are really quite similar, especially in their driving forces behind their writing styles in poetry. The lives of Plath and Olds are both expressive of the realities of a father-dominated family, in which both of these poets lost their fathers at a young age. This is significant because both poets have faced a similar traumatic event that has had everlasting effects on their adult womanhood, which is reflected in their writings. For both these woman, their accesses to father-daughter relationships were denied based on life circumstances. Ironically, their fathers were their muses for writing and are what made them the women they are today.
The points of comparison these two writers share are that they were both iconic poets of their day and that they wrote in what is referred to as “black dialect.” The differences between them are their cultural and educational backgrounds.
The theme of the suffering innocent person, dying and being diseased, throws a dark light onto the London seen through the eyes of William Blake. He shows us his experiences, fears and hopes with passionate images and metaphors creating a sensibility against oppression hypocrisy. His words come alive and ask for changes in society, government and church. But they remind us also that the continued renewal of society begins with new ideas, imagination and new works in every area of human experience.
The poetry by these two poets creates several different images, both overall, each with a different goal, have achieved their purposes. Though from slightly different times, they can both be recognized and appreciated as poets who did not fear the outside, and were willing to put themselves out there to create both truth and beauty.
(ll. 19-24) Wordsworth’s famous and simple poem, “I wandered lonely as a cloud,” expresses the Romantic Age’s appreciation for the beauty and truth that can be found in a setting as ordinary as a field of daffodils. With this final stanza, Wordsworth writes of the mind’s ability to carry those memories of nature’s beauty into any setting, whether city or country. His belief in the power of the imagination and the effect it can have on nature, and vice a versa, is evident in most of his work. This small
Robert Frost and Edgar Allen Poe two amazing poets, who created many well written poems, for instance “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening”, by Robert Frost and “The Raven” by Edgar Allen Poe. These two poems have many differences and similarities between them. A big difference between Frost and Poe is there back ground but this is also a similarity, how they took their real life situations and turned them into poetry. Then, their life situations made their tone in “Stopping by the Woods on a Snowy Evening” and “The Raven” completely different. But in these two poems there is a meaning behind them and the meanings are similar. Finally, a difference and similarity
Sylvia Plath’s life was full of disappointment, gloominess and resentment. Her relationship status with her parents was hostile and spiteful, especially with her father. Growing up during World War II did not help the mood of the nation either, which was dark and dreary. At age 8 Plath’s father of German ancestry died of diabetes and even though their relationship was never established nor secure, his death took a toll on her. “For Sylvia, who had been his favorite, it was an emotional holocaust and an experience from which she never fully recovered” (Kehoe 90). Since she was so young she never got to work out her unsettled feelings with him. Even at age eight, she hid when he was around because she was fearful of him. When she was in his presence his strict and authoritarian figure had left an overpowering barrier between their relationship. Sadly enough by age eight Plath instead of making memories with her dad playing in the yard she resented him and wanted nothing to do with him (Kehoe). These deep-seated feelings played a major role in Plath’s poetry writings. Along with his “hilterian figure,” her father’s attitude towards women was egotistical and dismissive, uncondemning. This behavior infuriated Plath; she was enraged about the double standard behavior towards women. Plath felt controlled in male-dominated world (Lant). “Because Plath associates power so exclusively with men, her conviction that femininity is suffocating and inhibiting comes as no surprise” (Lant 631). This idea of a male-dominated world also influenced Plath’s writing. Unfortunately, Plath married a man just like her father Ted Hughes. “Hughes abandonment apparently stirred in her the memories and feelings she had struggled with when her ...
Known for her distinctive voice and exploration of dark, violent emotions, Sylvia Plath was one of the most acclaimed poets of the twentieth century. In her poems she discusses many common themes such as family relations, marriage, self-image and death in unique ways. Among these topics, she expresses a particularly original perspective on motherhood and its effect on the individual that often deviates completely from the traditional view of child rearing. In her poems “Moonrise,” “Heavy Woman” and “Morning Song,” Plath conveys the idea that motherhood, although necessary, is a personal as well as physical sacrifice that involves much pain and suffering.
Both poems inspire their reader to look at their own life. In addition, they treat the reader to a full serving of historic literature that not only entertains, but also teaches valuable lesson in the form of morals and principles.
I am going to start by comparing the form of each poem. The souls of
The only strong comparison between the poets, in terms of structure and technique, is that the meaning of their poems run much deeper then the specific words on a page. Even this can come as a contrast when looking at these three poems. “Home Burial,” by Frost is a fairly straightforward poem, written in dialogue, with the writer working as the narrator. The poem is about a married couple dealing wi...
The poems ‘lines composed on Westminster Bridge’ and ‘London’ are created by William Wordsworth and William Blake respectively. Wordsworth’s work originated in the eighteenth century and he himself lived in the countryside, and rarely visited large cities such as London. This is reflected in his poem, making it personal to his experience in London, however William Blake on the other hand had a vast knowledge of London and was actually a London poet, which allowed him to express his views of London from a Londoner’s point of view. I therefore will be examining comparisons in both poems, as well as their contrasting views of London and the poetic devices used to express their opinions. Wordsworth believed in pantheism, the religion of nature, meaning he believed that nature depicted religion as well as the atmosphere of a particular place.
Death is inevitable and a lifelong process in every individual’s life. Most importantly, we are unaware of when or how it will happen and, because death can come at a time when we least expect it, it allows some individuals to fear death. In both poems, Lady Lazarus and Daddy, by Sylvia Plath, show different ways to view death. In Lady Lazarus, Plath talks about the characters attempts to commit suicide. Throughout the poem, we discover that the first time she tried to commit suicide was an accident while her second and third time were intentional. While Daddy reveals the process of how a girl came to terms with her father’s death. Although some may assert that the poems show rebirth, both poems reveal death as a way to escape from reality.