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Personification of death in poems
Metaphor and imagery in after apple picking by robert frost
Personification of death in poems
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Robert Frost's "After Apple-Picking"
In the poem “After Apple-Picking”, Robert Frost has cleverly disguised many symbols and allusions to enhance the meaning of the poem. One must understand the parallel to understand the central theme of the poem. The apple mentioned in the poem could be connected to the forbidden fruit from the Garden of Eden. It essentially is the beginning of everything earthly and heavenly, therefore repelling death. To understand the complete meaning of Frost’s poem one needs to be aware that for something to be dead, it must have once had life. Life and death are common themes in poetry, but this poem focuses on what is in between, life’s missed experiences and the regret that the speaker is left with.
Regret is defined as “a feeling of disappointment or distress about something that one wishes could be different” (www.dictionary.com). While there is no doubt that the speaker in this poem has had a very productive and worthwhile life, one gets the impression that there is still an empty feeling in his life, of which he can do nothing about. In lines 3-6, he reflectively states, “And there’s a barrel that I didn’t fill beside it, and there may be two or three apples I didn’t pick upon some bough”. Here, it is necessary to expand that idea the idea of the apples as a metaphor for life, and say that they also represent missed life experiences. As the speaker looks back on his life, he sees unfinished tasks, and thus he feels regret. It is important to note though, that he accepts the fact that he can do nothing about these unfinished tasks, and he is ready to move to a new and final stage in his life as he acknowledges that he “is done with apple-picking now” (6).
The reason for the reflection is evident when the speaker says, “I cannot rub the strangeness from my sight I got from looking through a pane of glass I skimmed this morning from the drinking trough and held against the world of hoary grass” (9-10). From this it seems as though the speaker has caught a glimpse of his reflection in the drinking trough and has noticed that the reflection was or gray with age. It appears as though the speaker does not merely see himself in the water’s reflection though; he also visualizes past visions and memories from his life.
Further on in the poem, the speaker says, “There were ten thousand thousand fruit to touch, Cherish in han...
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... or perhaps even to the “cellar” (a metaphor for Hell).
By the end of the poem, both the speaker and the reader have come to a general acceptance regarding the speaker’s looming death. It therefore comes as a bit of a shock when the speaker says, “Were he not gone, the woodchuck could say whether it’s like his long sleep, as I describe its coming on, or just some human sleep”. The metaphorical meaning of sleep in this poem has been previously established, however, a new definition surfaces as a result of this statement. Frost has just written of two different types of sleep—is it possible that he is talking about two different states of death? In searching for the significance of this statement, it is necessary to return to the apple and its representation of both life and death. The reader, as well as the speaker, is not sure if he is really dying or whether he has simply ceased feeling and experiencing life, thus causing the feelings of regret. It is interesting, though purely speculative, to note that in the year that Frost wrote this poem, he would be turning forty years old. One must wonder whether Frost was looking back on his own life thus far with some sort of regret.
In Galway Kinnell’s poem, “Blackberry Eating,” assonance, alliteration, and refrain are used in reinforcing the poem’s meaning that just like the speaker’s interest for “ripest” blackberries as described throughout the poem, words are also rich and intense, thus one is eating straight from the tree of knowledge.
In the Bontemps poem, he uses the metaphor of reaping and harvesting to express the bitterness felt by African Americans in a racist America. The metaphor explains that no matter how hard African Americans work, their reward will always be less than that of a White American. Bontemps feels that African Americans have labored long and hard enough for White Americans, and that it is time for all Americans to receive equal reward for equal work. In lines 11 and 12 Bontemps says "Small wonder then my children glean in fields / They have not sown, and feed of bitter fruit." These lines are a great example of the extended metaphor used throughout Bontemps poem, and show that he believes that no matter how hard he works to bring change, his children have already tasted the "bitter fruit" (line 12) of racial prejudice. Cullen also uses the extended metaphor of reaping and harvesting as evident in lines 1 and 2: "We shall not always plant while others reap / The golden increment of bursting fruit". Cullen uses these lines to express his pride in his race and to promote equality. He also says "So in the dark we hide the heart that bleeds, / And wait, and tend our agonizing seeds" (lines 13 and 14) to say that change will not happen overnight and that the wait for equality will be painful and
In the opening stanza, the speaker describes the human craving and longing for material objects. From the very first word of "Meditation 42," a sense of longing and desire infuses the poem as "apples" (ll. 1) often symbolize both temptation and desire. Because Eve allowed the lure of attaining the God's knowledge to overtake her in the book of Genesis, she bites from a fruit on the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil which is commonly depicted as an apple. In addition, because the "apples" allude to man's fall from paradise they thereby represent man's imperfection and sinful nature. Furthermore, the fact that "apples of gold in silver pictures shrined" (ll. 1) emphasizes the desire or lust for physical, material items of beauty and wealth. These items "enchant" (ll. 2) as the "gold" and "silver" appeal to mankind's covetous nature and tendency to value superficial items. Thus, the speaker conveys his longing and desire for physical riches which "enchant" him. Yet his want for treasures exist as strictly human desire, causing physical consequences as they "make mouths to water" (ll. 2).
In the second and last stanza of the poem we are reminded that he was but a child. The thought of losing the berries “always made him feel like crying” the thought of all that beauty gone so sour in the aftermath of lust. The lack of wisdom in younger years is emphasized by the common childish retort of “It wasn’t fair.” He kept up the childish hope that this time would be different, that this time the berries would keep and that the lust, work, and pain might not have been in vain, that others would not “glut” upon what he desired.
The night is a symbol for dark moments of solitude during the speaker’s life. Through being “acquainted with the night” (line 1), the speaker is saying that he is familiar with darkness, proving how symbolism brings out a detached tone with the help of diction, saying that isolated darkness is something the speaker experiences regularly. The exertion of the night as symbolism creates an image for readers to realize that Frost did not actually mean nighttime in his poem; he used the night as symbolism to provide deeper insight and bring the image of our own dark times to describe as “the night”(line 1) just as the speaker of “Acquainted With the Night” did. Symbolism goes on to present itself in line 2, the “rain” is used as a symbol for tears and melancholy. The rain was not meant to be read literally, but rather symbolically as tears, or times of mourning over the harsh struggles in life, just as the speaker did when he “walked out in rain and back in rain” (line 2) meaning he walked into and out of life’s struggles. If the weather is cold and rainy, no one goes outside because of the gloomy clouds and cold rain. Similarly, no one reached out to the speaker in “Acquainted With the Night” during his gloomy periods of “rain”(line 2) or sadness, which expresses
“We pluck and marvel for sheer joy. And the ones still green, sighing, leave upon the boughs…” (14-16). This emphasis on nature reflects the respect and connection to the natural world the culture was trying to convey in their poetry. The colorful and illustrative descriptions of the physical world are indicative of the mindset and focus of these poems. Namely the fact that they were concerned with the world around us and the reality we experience as opposed to that of abstract concept of god or the supernatural as seen in other historical texts. This focus on nature is important because it sets the context in which the major theme of loss and separation originate from. In this poem the poet chooses to emphasize the passing of time in the choice of comparing the two seasons. Spring, in which life begins a new, and fall, in which the leaves begin to fall off and die. The poem reads “And the ones still green, sighing, leave upon the boughs- Those are the ones I hate to lose. For me, it is the autumn hills” (15-18). This juxtaposition of these two
On the surface the poem seems to be a meditation on past events and actions, a contemplative reflection about what has gone on before. Research into the poem informs us that the poem is written with a sense of irony
Frost begins the poem by describing a young boy cutting some wood using a "buzz-saw." The setting is Vermont and the time is late afternoon. The sun is setting and the boy's sister calls he and the other workers to come for "Supper." As the boy hears its dinnertime, he gets excited and cuts his hand on accident. Immediately realizing that the doctor might amputate his hand, he asks his sister to make sure that it does not happen. By the time the doctor arrives, it is too late and the boy's hand is already lost. When the doctor gives him anaesthetic, he falls asleep and never wakes up again. The last sentence of the poem, "since they (the boys family and the doctor) were not the one dead, turned to their affairs" shows how although the boys death is tragic, people move on with their life in a way conveying the idea that people only care for themselves.
Frost's poem addresses the tragic transitory nature of living things; from the moment of conception, we are ever-striding towards death. Frost offers no remedy for the universal illness of aging; no solution to the fact that the glory of youth lasts only a moment. He merely commits to writing a deliberation of what he understands to be a reality, however tragic. The affliction of dissatisfaction that Frost suffers from cannot be treated in any tangible way. Frost's response is to refuse to silently buckle to the seemingly sadistic ways of the world. He attacks the culprit of aging the only way one can attack the enigmatic forces of the universe, by naming it as the tragedy that it is.
In the first quatrain of the poem the speaker compares himself to autumn. The speaker says, “That time of year thou mayst in me behold” (1). He is seeing himself as the fall season of the year. A time of the year when nights arrive quicker and the temperature becomes cooler. When relating this season to life, it is when a person is experiencing stages of decline in their life making them closer to death. He creates an image of a tree, with leaves that have been falling with the change of season into winter. “When yellow leaves, or none, or few, do hang.” (2) When using the image of leaves falling from a tree and leaving it bare,
The poem includes personification, foreshadowing, metaphors, irony, symbols, alliteration and much more. The author uses foreshadowing throughout the poem. There are several words that start with “S” used in the poem, which is a traditional form of alliteration to convey a negative situation. For example, As well, when the doctor later comes to help, his visit is described with the phrase “dark of ether,” which is warning the reader that the boy is soon to die. The first line of the poem is, ““The buzz saw snarled and rattled in the yard.” The use of personification implies to the saw which is ironic. Later in the poem, the boy’s sister calls out that it is supper time, and Frost explains the buzz saw does not know what “supper” is. This is the point where tragically the youth’s hand is cut off. Two metaphors used in the poem are "Call it a day" and "No more to build on there". These two metaphors are very important and significant. The first one (call it a day) means to be done with work. The boy didn’t stop working, but if he did, his hand wouldn’t have been cut by the saw. The second one (no more to build on there) means the child’s life is over. If he did “call it a day” and went inside for supper, he would’ve still been
Robert Frost uses metaphor and symbolism extensively in ‘Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening’, developing deeper and more complex meanings from a superficially simple poem. Frost’s own analysis contributes greatly to our appreciation of the importance of metaphor, claiming that “metaphor [is] the whole of thinking,” inviting the reader to interpret the beautiful scene in a more profound way. However, the multitude of possible interpretations sees it being read as either carefully crafted lyric, a “suicide poem, [or] as recording a single autobiographical incident” . Judith Oster argues, therefore, that the social conditions individual to each reader tangibly alter our understanding of metaphor. Despite the simplicity of language, Frost uses conventional metaphors to explore complex ideas about life, death and nature. The uncertainty, even in the concluding stanza, that encompasses the poem only adds to the depth of possible readings.
Alliteration is used quite often in the poem. Throughout the whole poem, there is a frequent repetition of “b” words, such as “big dark blobs burned”. In the readers mind, this creates a more powerful image of the berries, and gives a strong impression of their shape and colour.
The vivid imagery, symbolism, metaphors make his poetry elusive, through these elements Frost is able to give nature its dark side. It is these elements that must be analyzed to discover the hidden dark meaning within Roberts Frost’s poems. Lines that seemed simple at first become more complex after the reader analyzes the poem using elements of poetry. For example, in the poem Mending Wall it appears that Robert frost is talking about two man arguing about a wall but at a closer look the reader realizes that the poem is about the things that separate man from man, which can be viewed as destructive. In After Apple Picking, the darkness of nature is present through the man wanting sleep, which is symbolic of death. It might seem that the poem is about apple picking and hard work but it is actually about the nature of death.
The first stanza opens up with saying how the speaker was young and did not have a care in the world. The first line talks about him relaxing under an apple bough, which is an apple tree. He also goes on to explain in line two that he is as “happy as the grass was green” (2), which