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Comparing Daystar and Those Winter Sundays Essay

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The two poems I have chosen to analyze are Daystar by Rita Dove and Those Winter Sundays by Robert Hayden. The poem Daystar struck me from my first reading of it because I do the same thing this woman did sometimes. The apartment I share with my husband has a balcony where I have planted some flowers, and sometimes when the whether is nice I drag a rocking chair out there into the sun and just sit and let my thoughts wander. This poem reminds me of those moments. The author uses imagery in the poem to make the experience of this one woman stand out vividly. The first lines of the poem say "she saw diapers steaming on the line / a doll slumped behind the door." The phrase "steaming on the line" is especially strong, making me …show more content…

When Liza appears on the stairs, she wonders "just what was mother doing / out back with the field mice? Why / building a palace." It may look to everyone else like the woman is just sitting there wasting her time, but actually she is doing something constructive, which may be the most important part of her day. She is relaxing and clearing her mind of all the worries that have cluttered it up. She may also be reflecting on who she is as a person and where she is in her life. She may be doing something similar to meditating or praying, and it refreshes her and gives her energy to accomplish the rest of the things she must do today. That this moment may be the most important one in her day is hinted at later in the poem where it says, "that night when Thomas rolled over and / lurched into her," she thought of "the place that was hers." I don't know if that line means that he wanted to have sex with her, or that he just bumped her and it woke her up. But either way, the poem uses the word "lurched," which has a negative conation. Whatever Thomas did bothered her, and this bothersome thing made her think of her special place. This shows that reflecting on the time she spends building her "palace" is a source of comfort for her. The last line of the poem is my favorite, where the author says "she was nothing / pure nothing, in the middle of the day." This is a paradox, because obviously the woman does not cease

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