Analysing the two poems of: Island man and Two Scavengers in a Truck, Two Beautiful People in a Mercedes and how the poet creates conflict
Firstly, we began to read Island Man as a class in lessons. This is written by Grace Nichols and is published in a book titled “Anthology”. The surface meaning of the poem is based on a man who used to live on a Caribbean island and still dreams of this place even now when he lives in London. At a first glace of the poem, it comes across as short and sharp, for example, the first line of the poem consists of the word “Morning”. This may look as though a far from exciting way for a poem to begin, but from this, the author is starting to create an image in the readers head and this is setting the
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An echoing technique is used with the repetition of the line “groggily groggily” when the next stanza begins with “muffling muffling” emphasizing that the character can’t get the city noises out of his head. These sounds give the feeling of being enclosed somewhere, which is portraying his feelings towards London city.
The lack of punctuation in the poem lets it run freely, again, this could reflect on the characters feelings of wanting to be free and live naturally on an island. The irregular lengths and placing of lines is to form a visual pattern resembling the shore and tide. ‘Island Man’ is just nineteen lines in length but the writer seems to capture his feelings well and makes you feel sympathy for the character. However the conflict is shown within the two places and how the man feels about these places. He obviously strongly dislikes the dullness of London and city life, and wishes he was living on an island where he imagines himself to be. The poet shows this by creating two completely different images in the readers head, one being described as a beautiful and warming place, and the other a dull, noisy and polluted place.
Lawrence Ferlinghetti writes ‘Two Scavengers In a Truck, Two Beautiful People in a Mercedes’. The poem’s surface meaning is the writer recalling a moment in a life when a garbage truck and a Mercedes were both stopped at traffic lights. It is built
Cummings and Pablo Neruda present the theme of their poems by having their two speakers addressing the women they love. The two speakers cope with the idea of prospective change in two completely different ways: Cummings’s speaker faces the end of his relationship as a situation that hurts him but in the end he accepts it, while Neruda’s speaker doesn’t care about his lover’s past as the only thing he wants is to make a couple with her. Thus, there are both similarities and differences in the poetic devices used in the two poems, while the tone of the speakers’ voice differs too, as in the first poem is sad and melancholic whereas in the second poem is confident and
In Two Scavengers in a Truck and Two Beautiful People in a Mercedes, there are two homeless men and two rich couple. The poet uses imagery to illustrate the inequalities between the two groups. One of the scavengers’ appearance is described as ‘grey iron hair’ and ‘hunched back’, which make readers imagine that he is old, tired, lifeless and miserable. The poet also describes him as a ‘gargoyle Quasimodo’. This imagery gives you the image of an aged, ugly and deformed man. The two
Richard Blanco is a Cuban- American poet who was given the oppurunity to write an inaugaration poem for Barack Obama's second swearing-in. He wrote a poem titled "One Today" that praised the good and unique things about the United States and also the everyday people who's daily routines help to make America the proud country that it is.
The setting of this poem is in a rural part of an unnamed Southern state, off of Highway 96 at Cherrylog Road. It is at the peak of a summer afternoon in a junkyard full of discarded automobiles. This setting affects the reader’s perception of this poem by using a hot southern junkyard with an active sun that is “eating the paint in blisters from a hundred car
The structure of the poem is free, and what it does is to give us the spirit of the sea. The poem is written in free verse, there is no restrictions of formal rhyme or meter. However, the length of the three stanzas of the poem is very even although it is not exact. It makes the flow of the entire poem became balanced. This form of structure is just like the wave of the sea. The period of the wave is natural and balanced; it is pretty even but it is not exact. Also, there are a lot of commas in the poem. Keeping using commas makes the sentences very long. In fact, the entire poem is constructed by 6 sentences only. It makes the feeling of the poem just like the sea, and lines of the poem are the wave of the sea. Each endings of the waves are
The setting of Alistair Macleod’s short story, The Boat, complements the setting of Alden Nowlan’s poem, Warren Pryor. Each of these writing pieces contain the element of a smaller town with a tight knit community. In the short story The Boat, our community is a Nova Scotian community whose primary industry is fishing. This results in most of the members of the community partaking in the fishing lifestyle. Another influential location this writing piece takes place in is inside of the house, “which was one of about fifty that marched around the horseshoe of [his] harbour,” (Macleod 263). Most of the homes in this town are situated close to the water as it is there where most of the men work as fishermen. Inside the house was his father's room where “magazines and books covered the bureau,” (Macleod 265). It was in their father’s room where the children discover their love of reading and become more dedicated to their schooling. Both the short story and the poem contain the setting of a school, which is symbolic as it is their education that allows the characters to be free of their obligations and the way of their town. Finally, the setting takes place on the Jenny Lynn, “she was what Nova Scotians called a Cape Island boat and was designed for the small inshore fishermen,” (Macleod 262) and it is on this boat where the father and son make their final journey out to sea. Likewise, the poem Warren Pryor takes place in another resource based community, however, this
Poetry is often dissected until there is nothing left but a tired meaning or beaten down theme left. The beauty is often lost on the incessant search for a deeper meaning and the flow of the lines and stanzas is often forgotten in the intrusive prodding to find something more. Both poems, “Introduction to Poetry” and “Poetry Should Ride the Bus,” exemplify this opinion on the study of poetry, and challenge the traditional views of poetry in the sense that poetry is not there to be a source of deeper meaning. Rather, it is there to fill the reader with a sense of something more and be a literary treasure written to beautify the mind and unearth something in the reader. I want them to water-ski across the surface of a poem waving at the
understand and it makes the poem look as if the poem would be good to
Poetry is an example of written literature. In ancient Greek, poetry means “I create” – an art form in which language is used for its aesthetic qualities (Poetry.org, 2005). Poetry is a piece of literature that helps people to express their feelings and emotions. People can express their sad, happy, and romantic feelings through poetry. There are many poets in the United States such as Theodore Roethke, Robert frost, Emily Dickinson, William Carlos Williams, and many others. In this paper, there will be an introduction to William Carlos Williams and one of his poems, “The Red Wheelbarrow”. There would be also an explication of the poem based on reader’s interpretation.
In this essay I will be comparing two poems which show connections between people and the places in which they live. The two poems I will be comparing and contrasting are “Blessing” by imtiaz Dharker and “Island Man” by Grace Nichols. Both of these poets express their feelings through these poems. Grace Nichols allocates her experiences of how people feel when separated from the environment and place they lived in for such a long period of time. On the contrary Imtiaz Dharker uses the poem “Blessing” to convey the importance of water for less fortunate people. From both of the poems I have chosen I can see that the poets have written about something they feel is important. The reason why I have chosen these two poems is because both of the
Upon reading the two poems, I quickly found myself interested in Steve Orlens’ “For the El Camino”. What instantly struck me was the entire structure of the poem, and the almost chronological set-up throughout the story given. When compared to the poem “The Oldest Living Thing in L.A”, I became aware that I would have to re-read Orlens poem more than the other. In doing so, I was able to try to fully grasp the background of what he was saying. For example, while reading about the El Camino, It didn't occur to me that the two younger adults were having sex in the back of the car. Only after reading it multiple times, I was then able to piece the story together. The poet creates a story within the poem that makes the reader question the relationship
In the poem “The Red Wheelbarrow” by William Carlos Williams, Williams describes a wheelbarrow as something that is practical yet beautiful. Although Williams’ poem is only sixteen words long, he chooses each word carefully to give readers an aesthetically pleasing image of the wheelbarrow and setting. Williams also appeals to the reader’s senses by leading them to imagine hearing the sound of the rain and seeing the bright red color of the wheelbarrow. Something that I see as practical yet beautiful is a paintbrush.
In his observation he sees the garbagemen or ‘scavengers’ tired and weary from their route, working hard but still in unavoidable poverty. Also using a word like scavengers he compares the garbagemen to rodents scrounging a living at the bottom of society. He then sees the ‘elegant’ couple in an ‘elegant’ Mercedes, loving their life, not
In William Carlos William’s poem, “Red Wheelbarrow,” he describes a deceptively simple scene with just a few words in eight lines. The passing reader would perhaps look over the poem in just a couple of seconds and read it off as a frivolous or nonsensical poem that most likely has no explanation. Readers who actually look into the backstory, the form, and the meaning lying in the poem’s sixteen words, though, might discover something about the poet, and themselves also.
Stafford furtively conceals the profound meaning of his poem behind a story of the narrator, who stops alongside the road to care for a deer. The genius behind poem is better understood when the superficial meaning is expressed deeply.