When I Heard The Learn D Armstronomer Analysis

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Recommended: Comparative analysis of two poems

Some believe that life follows a timeline and everyone’s lives have been planned out. Cummings’ “since feeling is first” and Walt Whitman’s “When I heard the learn’d astronomer” show us that life is too short to worry and that we should follow our own life paths. Cummings’ poem suggests that those who concern about living life in order, will not truly enjoy things in life as simple as a kiss. Whiteman’s poem shows that the speaker learns that looking past what the astronomer teaches and the structure of learning, he can find beauty in what he loves. Though “since feeling is first” by E.E. Cummings and Walt Whitman’s “When I heard the learn’d astronomer” have few differences, the two poems similarly demonstrate that life should not be lived by a specific structure through poetic techniques such as the use of …show more content…

The first stanza from Cummings’ poem states that those who pay attention to arrangement in life will not live up to all opportunities given to them: “who pays attention / to the syntax of things / will never wholly kiss you;” (Cummings l.2-4) The diction of “will never wholly kiss you” is like saying “you will not enjoy as simple as a kiss.” Also mentioned is “to the syntax of things” which is like saying “how things are arranged,” which is suggesting an order. Similarly, in Whiteman’s poem, the speaker mentions: “When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, / When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them,” (Whitman l.2-3) the diction of these things symbolize a typical structure of teaching. “Columns ranged before me” is another way of describing an order. The speaker then states: “How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick,” (Whiteman l.7) as if he is becoming tired from listening to the astronomer talk about the same

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