Ryleigh Morheouse- _My Fathers Song_ Poetic Elements

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ENGLISH LI

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English

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Oct 30, 2023

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Ryleigh Morehouse Aaron Holman AP English Lit 3 October 2023 Song the Language of the Soul In the poem “My Father’s Song” by Simon Ortiz , the author captures a memento of his father that describes with such depth the aspects of their relationship. This poem was written in the year 1977, which was a time when Native Americans were underrepresented and prejudiced against; since Simon Ortiz was a part of the Native American community he made it a point to create a memorable yet kinder present that would follow afterward to influence others in the community. Hence, Ortiz’s purpose for this poem was to illustrate a kind and memorable precedence for his father to be remembered by many. Ortiz uses different types of poetic elements such as syntax to determine focus points, unique symbols to enhance literary meaning, and other literary devices, in order to express these memories and mementos of Ortiz's father and their relationship. The first poetic element, one of the most forward, is the poet's use of syntax. In contrast to most poems, this poem is not divided into different sentences. In this free verse, Ortiz structured a poem with sentence fragments. Since he starts with “Wanting to say things, ” it opens the door for the reader to focus on each thought in every line of the poem (Ortiz line 1). Therefore, the reader's understanding of each thought is more in-depth in terms of the writer's emotions and tone. The structure of the poem describes and separates different tones. The poet starts right off with how Ortiz missed his “father” that night (Ortiz line 2). Speakers and the audience are automatically in a state of vulnerability as a result. Thus, the structure of the poem ties in with the tone the speaker is conveying to the audience.

Ryleigh Morehouse Aaron Holman AP English Lit 3 October 2023 In addition, Ortiz incorporated various symbols into his text to enhance its meaning. Using "mice" as a metaphor to describe innocent bystanders passing through life enhances the symbolic meaning of "planting corn" as a metaphor for taking simple actions in life (Ortiz line 8, 25). Therefore, the author illustrates the idea that, throughout the speaker's life, his father was there for him, even through the simplest actions one might take throughout the day. This contributes to the idea of the speaker wanting to illustrate the personal relationship with his father even when he was an innocent “mouse” who was “planting corn” throughout the fields (Ortiz line 8,16). Ortiz continues to explain how his father nurtured him like “the burrow nest of a mouse” (Ortiz line 16). This enhances the meaning of the text by using these symbols to convey how a father was always protecting and nurturing the relationship between a mouse and its nest. It describes the sense of security that the poet feels with his dad by his side. Lastly, Ortiz describes the author's purpose and meaning through a variety of literary devices. As the speaker describes different earth elements it allows for an additional purpose of imagery in the text. Ortiz narrates the "soft moist sand" into the text to describe earth elements in his memories of his father(Ortiz line 17). Using imagery to describe earth elements enhances the father-son relationship's meaning. Therefore, by introducing earth elements it allows the reader to create an image of the speaker grounding his memories of his father into the earth, hence the use of different earth elements. Additionally, the poet uses enjambment in the first and second stanzas to increase the tension of emotion between the speaker and the audience as he describes his "emotions" throughout the texts with such vulnerability (Ortiz line 5). Continuing between these two stanzas allows the audience to connect with the text's meaning.

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