Marianne Boruch's Year in Hawaii
In her poem, “Year In Hawaii,” Marianne Boruch effectively portrays the feeling of an endless, motionless setting. This lyric poem attempts to transcend time by working with timelessness. The key lines to the poem take place at the very beginning, “The ocean takes so long/to think about.” Immediately the reader is met with mixed sensations of timelessness as well as restlessness. There’s a dreamy, sluggish feel to her wording. Using the ocean is perfect for evoking this, as looking out at the water, “Distance stops; one sees the endless line/of something.” So much empty space rolling out and out until it meets the sky. Boruch goes on to make her stance even clearer, “I was a toad/there, a river thing that got lost.” She places herself as a small, tiny creature that has no grasp of how big its surroundings are.
After setting the mood in this tropical haven, Boruch makes a point to explain, “I never had a vision/about the place. I never thought: this/is the beginning of the world.” Boruch lets the reader know this is not a dream world, this is not something that can be conjured up in the mind and cradled whenever desired. Her time in Hawaii is something that she could have never imagined. This helps the flow of the poem, as she then depicts how easily pleased humans are. “You’ve seen/the postcards. People buy them thinking/everything worthwhile comes/through a camera lens, and they put them/in a pocket or down the dark throat/of a mailbox someone later opens/with a key.” Finding themselves in this unimaginable tropical island, humans try to capture the unexplainable on a piece of paper and bring it home to their safe comforts. Going back to the running theme of restlessness, Boruch portrays the human desire to be able to see the beauty of this landscape and the resulting unawareness of how unattainable it is. Amazed, they get there and think it is a material thing, believing that a simple postcard will do justice to their paradise.
Even though she seems to be depicting a ‘paradise’ mind, Boruch immediately switches over to an ‘everyday’ mind. She describes the natives, “wanting just to live there, thank you,/going off to work and coming back, normal/things.” It’s as though the natives bring the poem back into time again, while the tourists had been stuck in timelessness.
As a native Hawaiian, Kristiana Kahakauwila has extensive knowledge on Hawaiian customs and culture. Though she was not raised in Hawaii, Kristiana is still connected to the culture. Her upbringing in California did not separate her from the customs of Hawaii. Kristiana has a master’s in fine arts and a degree in comparative literature. Her degrees and background with Hawaiian culture led her to write the book “This is Paradise,” which is composed of multiple short stories. Each short story unveils a new layer of Hawaiian culture that many people tend to overlook. Before the first short story begins, Kristiana sets the tone for the novel with the cover of the book.
The girl shown in the advertisement is shown to be laughing and is also wearing white satin, ‘In taunted white satin’. This gives the idea of the girl being unspoilt, virginal and pure. This deludes the reader of the poster into thinking that this is what Prestatyn is actually like: unspoilt and pure. The poem goes on to describing the palm trees at Prestatyn and the coast. This is described as, ‘…a hunk of coast, a hotel with palms’. This ‘hunk of coast’ suggests manliness and the palm trees also suggest an erotic type of Eden. This gives the reader the illusion that Prestatyn will be the holiday of their dreams. We are then given the image of the girl offering her palms to the reader, ‘…and spread breast-lifting arms’; this line gives the reader delight or excitement at the end of the first stanza, deluding the reader even more. In this first stanza the illusion and image of the perfect place is built up.
In the first stanza, a general location of “here” and “there” is established for the reader (Trethewey, 1). To determine the meaning of these places, one must analyze the poem in reverse chronological order. When considering those destinations under the context of the whole poem, it is clear that the “there” is Ship Island (Trethewey, 1). However, the hidden implication is that Ship Island is an allegory for the collision of innocence and maturity. Ship Island was first used as a military base during the War of 1812 and evolved into a family friendly beach destination over the years. This island stood as a barrier to the main land during Hurricane Katrina and endured the first wave of damage during the storm. Ship Island has since recovered and continues to thrive as a popular tourist destination. Throughout its history, Ship Island has rotated back and forth between being a place that embodies maturity and hardship to a place and one that is consumed with the frivolous cares of a beach trip. Ironically, Ship Island is often considered as a peaceful rest in the midst the world’s trials; however, it is simultaneously associated with tragic memories for many throughout Gulfport. Therefore, based on the historical context, it is evident that Ship Island is an allegory the apex of maturity and innocence
She turned her face seaward to gather in an impression of space and solitude, which the vast expanse of water, meeting and melting with the moonlit sky, conveyed to her excited fancy. As she swam she seemed to be reaching out for the unlimited in which to lose herself.
The ocean is mysterious to mankind. The unfathomable vastness of the ocean intrigues humanity into exploring it. In life, the immense possibilities that lie in the future compel us to reach for the stars. In the poem “The Story” by Karen Connelly, an individual willingly swims into deep waters even though they are fearful of what may exist in the waters. The swimmer later finds out that their fears were foolish, which illustrates the human tendency to venture into the unknown. The theme conveyed in this poem is that life is like a rough, uncertain, uncontrollable ocean that we must find get through with experience.
The presence and embrace of the sea is a constant acquaintance to Edna. In contrast, her husband frequents the club and children who are unattended by her. The continual presence of the sea allows Edna to reflect on her life such as seeing her image on the surface of water.
The poems facilitate the investigation of human experience through illustrating life’s transience and the longevity of memory.
Therefore, Oliver’s incorporation of imagery, setting, and mood to control the perspective of her own poem, as well as to further build the contrast she establishes through the speaker, serves a critical role in creating the lesson of the work. Oliver’s poem essentially gives the poet an ultimatum; either he can go to the “cave behind all that / jubilation” (10-11) produced by a waterfall to “drip with despair” (14) without disturbing the world with his misery, or, instead, he can mimic the thrush who sings its poetry from a “green branch” (15) on which the “passing foil of the water” (16) gently brushes its feathers. The contrast between these two images is quite pronounced, and the intention of such description is to persuade the audience by setting their mood towards the two poets to match that of the speaker. The most apparent difference between these two depictions is the gracelessness of the first versus the gracefulness of the second. Within the poem’s content, the setting has been skillfully intertwined with both imagery and mood to create an understanding of the two poets, whose surroundings characterize them. The poet stands alone in a cave “to cry aloud for [his] / mistakes” while the thrush shares its beautiful and lovely music with the world (1-2). As such, the overall function of these three elements within the poem is to portray the
“I had been born into a raging ocean where I swam relentlessly, flailing my arms in hope of rescue, of reaching a shoreline I never sighted. Never solid ground beneath me, never a resting place. I had lived with only the desperate hope to stay afloat; that and nothing more. But when at last I wrote my first words in the page, I felt an island rising beneath my feet like the back of a whale”.
Audience, tone, and mood are key aspects towards the understanding of this poem. The audience in this poem includes everybody specifically those who are ignorant to the life and culture of aboriginal living on reserves. The tone is positive and establishes the true essence and pure beauty of nature. The tone could also be reflective because it reflects upon the qualities that accompany life on the reserve. The reader can simply infer that the mood is peaceful, hopeful, cheerful, and
Imagine a scene in which a small, wooden boat is peacefully floating on the ocean. Now, imagine that the scene is panning out to reveal the boat is merely a tiny speck, the ocean reaching out endlessly around it. Suddenly, the peaceful quality of the boat has been replaced by a feeling of consuming meaninglessness. Stephen Crane, a naturalist writer and reporter in nineteenth century America, often used nature to prompt readers into questioning their purpose and place in the universe. In “The Open Boat,” complex symbolism allows Crane’s characters to reflect humanity's shared experience regarding existence and self-worth.
It is the landscape and Achille has found his happiness and appreciates the only home he knows and what ties him to this homeland. Walcott has taken the frame of the epic and given the Caribbean voice and struggle.
In this poem, the speaker is talks about his experiences in one significant morning. The poem introduces a beach environment where the speaker talks about collecting rocks, while seeing a dead otter, an oyster fisher, and a bird trying to find its prey. He recalls that this morning is the morning after contemplating of dying, but in the second stanza he has a change of feeling. Instead of seeing disturbances, he sees things that symbolize piece and serenity – butterflies, a couple, the sun. Taking into account all these literal events make the story far too normal. However, what makes this poem noteworthy is its two-sided arguments for the natural order of the world – chaotic in nature or underlying order.
To begin, the reader may gather that the poem has a very dark and saddened tone. Due to Lowell's vivid imagery, a mental image of a dark urban setting is created. It also seems very cold, with the mentioning of wind and nighttime. Readers may be able to relate to urban places they know, adding to the reality of the poem. Connections can be made. The imagery is left in such a way that the reader can fill in the gaps with their own memories or settings. Also, since the poem uses free verse, the structure is left open to interpretation. This makes the poem more inviting and easier to interpret, rather than reading it as a riddle. However, though simple in imagery, the poem still captures the reader's interest due to the creation it sparks, yet it never strays away from the theme of bei...
This poem is full of visual imagery; one can imagine being the speaker, staring at the fish on the hook. The fish’s brown skin, shapes on his scales, the tiny white sea-lice, the green weed, the blood flowing from his gills, his entrails, and his pink bladder all describing the fish’s body. This allows the reader to imagine as if the fish was in their hands. She not only illustrates the fish as a whole but also ge...