To Be of Use Analysis Well-known poet and novelist, Marge Piercy, in her poem, To Be of Use, describes the people she admires and loves. Piercy’s purpose is to convey the idea that we should all be of use and we should each find a purpose. The author creates an admirable tone towards hard-working people in order to appeal to similar feelings in her readers. Piercy begins her poem by boldly describing the people she loves best. The speaker declares, “ The people I love the best jump into work head first without dallying in the shallows.” With this statement, she implies that she admires people who are not lazy and do their jobs without delay. Piercy continues to describe her admiration for hard-working people with the metaphor: “ They seem
In order to understand the poem we need to understand the author’s background and their work focus. Marge Piercy was born in Michigan, she was the first person in her family
Influenced by the style of “plainspoken English” utilized by Phillip Larkin (“Deborah Garrison”), Deborah Garrison writes what she knows, with seemingly simple language, and incorporating aspects of her life into her poetry. As a working mother, the narrator of Garrison’s, “Sestina for the Working Mother” provides insight for the readers regarding inner thoughts and emotions she experiences in her everyday life. Performing the daily circus act of balancing work and motherhood, she, daydreams of how life might be and struggles with guilt, before ultimately realizing her chosen path is what it right for her and her family.
Marchino, Lois A. "My Last Duchess." Masterplots II: Poetry Series. Ed. Frank N. Magill. Vol. 4. Pasadena: Salem, 1992. 1443-1445.
In lines 1 and 7 she was fine before she was mocked in her teenage years, “This girlchild was born as usual” and “She was healthy, tested intelligent”. Piercy shows the readers that before she was told of her imperfections, that she was a completely healthy and normal girl. She could have lived long pasted her teenage years, but with society telling her that her nose and legs were not considered perfect, she cut them off and died. Though Piercy did exaggerate the action, young teenagers and young adults have actions that leads to death. Some people starve, excessive exercise, Botox injections, plastic surgery, or even take pills to lose weight. These actions cost the lives of girls and boys all over the world and as society grows with more ways to bring out the negativity in a person’s body image, society should try to bring out positivity and confidence in everyone. In the poem “Hanging Fire” the speaker looks back at the choices she has made throughout her high school life and questions many aspects of her life. She questioned certain imperfection of beauty she had to deal with even though they are completely common in many teenagers. The reader can see the speaker questioning her beauty in lines 6-7 and 28-30 “How come my knees are //always so ashy?” and “Why do I have to be// the one //wearing braces”. Though these imperfections are normal for a teenager, society has made many
Many of the poems in this section are deep, and some may even consider them inappropriate. We see a new style of writing that we don’t get earlier on in the book, where Montilla creates and describes to us her hopes and dreams, and even her darkest fantasies. This section stresses the idea of humans seeking other humans, and implies that forever isn’t always in our thoughts. For some time, we read about love, until the last poem of the book leaves us thinking if it’s the most important thing to question. The poem “No More Love Poems” hits hard when she mentions being a victim, and living in a world where love is also supposed to mean peace. The last line is the most powerful of all, where she writes “Not one more, because in my world: we kill each other-“ The end of the book oversees everything that you have just read, and while you may have still been lingering on one of the previous love stories, she wants you to think otherwise, and maybe wonder why this poem is the last in her
"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock." Poetry for Students. Ed. Marie Rose Napierkowski and Mary Ruby.
She defines her idea of what is right in a relationship by describing how hard and painful it is for her to stray from that ideal in this instance. As the poem evolves, one can begin to see the author having a conflict with values, while simultaneously expressing which values are hers and which are unnatural to her. She accomplishes this accounting of values by personalizing her position in a somewhat unsettling way throughout the poem.
Thanks to the incredible job that Browning did on these poems, readers are now more fully able to grasp the passion and the love that this woman had for her lover. Perhaps they can even connect if they have a lover of their own whom they adore with their "breath, smiles, and tears."
“Happiness” by Jane Kenyon is a poem that uses enhanced language and effective literary devices to elevate Kenyon’s poem above the others on the poetry 180 website. She establishes an allusion to the prodigal son; “... or the way it turns up like a prodigal/ who comes back to the dust at your feet”(2-3). This allows the author to speak to those of a Christian background, but eliminates the poems universality. Furthermore, Kenyon’s use of alliteration when describing the “... clerk stacking cans of carrots”, emphasizes how something so mundane can still bring a person happiness. Similarly, the use of imagery enables the audience to visualize what the author is conveying to create a personal connection. “You made a feast in honour of what/ was
"Love Poems And Quotes- The Most Romantic Love Poems on the Web -." Love Poems And Quotes. N.p., Aug. 2013. Web. 09 May 2014. .
On the surface Philip Sidney’s “Astrophil and Stella” is a poem about courting a young woman. It is a common assumption and an easily justified one. The title presumes as much as the “star lover” clings to hopes of attaining the “star”. Astrophil attempts to win the heart of Stella through his poetry. Although he is not short of emotion he is in search of adequate words. The true purpose of the poem reveals itself at the end, “look in thy heart, and write” (Sidney Line 14). This sonnet is about the courting of a lover, but it is more importantly the story of numerous writers throughout time. Sidney is portraying the writer with writer’s block and the method to subjugate this voluminous evil. Every writer, at one time or another develops a case of writer’s block. A period in which it becomes difficult to express your thoughts or ideas on paper with the qualities the writer desires. Astrophil and Stella is a metaphor for the relationship between a writer and his audience, a writer and his work, a writer at battle with writer’s block.
his love . This twenty line poem is also made memorable by the way the
When we sacrifice our time to help someone in need, whether it is a great or small need, we become a part of their life and can help alleviate heavy burdens. We feel good for looking outside ourselves and contributin...
This change in mental state accounts for the change in language from the unflattering descriptions early on to the more loving and affectionate feelings expressed later in the poem. This continued consumption of alcohol results in the speaker 's proclamation of love -- a state defined as "rare" because it will most likely be gone in the morning. It is clear in the poem that the speaker 's complex maze of attraction and derision is cyclic, transforming the unattractive innkeeper to the prized jewel of his eye on a weekly or perhaps daily basis. Through the clever use of negative descriptions and false comparisons, the author confides to paper what is effectively a bipolar relationship with the woman he both loathes and
The poem is in free form and divided into five stanzas of unequal length. Weaving through the poem is a series of metaphors, these link physical aspects of life to abstract ideas regarding love. The essence of these changing metaphors remains the same: love is a journey, a journey of