Comparison of Whitman and Dickenson Poems

She says that “hope” is the thing with feathers. That perches in the soul “ (Emily Dickinson). Author states that “hope” is compared with a bird. Bird has feathers in spite of every failed flight, it gets up and tries to maintain height through its falls. She says that “and sign

Walt Whitman’s poem, “O Captain! My Captain!” expresses many feelings throughout. He expresses the mournfulness that the nation felt after President Abraham Lincoln’s assassination. It is especially evident when he wrote, “But I with mournful tread, / Walk the deck my Captain lies, / Fallen cold and dead” (Whitman 22-24). Whitman uses carefully selected word that let the reader know what has happened recently and show the heavy heart people now bear. He expresses the grief of a nation through imagery within his poem. This imagery helps give the reader an even clearer image and sense of what feelings and emotions, both abstract ideas, are present within the nation during this

This poem has a repeating AABB rhyme scheme which goes for 16 lines and the only other thing I could find is alliteration for one thing and that was

The difference in tone found in Whitman and Dickinson’s poems is in Emily Dickson’s poem “I like to see it lap the miles,” the tone is playful and it is a riddle comparing a train to some sort of animal. In Whitman “To a Locomotive in the Winter,” the tone is happy and admiration as he uses singular pronouns “thy” and “thee” in the beginning of the story. His poem celebrates the industrial achievement symbolized by a mechanical machine “the steam locomotive” which is a train.

In Emily Dickenson’s poem “Hope is the thing with Feathers,” she is creating a metaphor of hope through a bird. Dickenson spend most of her life isolated using her poetry to show her inner emotions. The hope that is within the author is like a bird that continues to fly inside her. The poems tone is encouraging and optimistic. The author is trying to explain to the reader that hope is everywhere and offers encouragement through struggles. Throughout the poem the author uses metaphor, symbolism, and personification to illustrate hope

“Hope is the thing with feathers that perches in the soul and sings…” In the poem Hope is a bird that sings for you through the good and bad, but never asks you for food. Emily Dickinson presents the theme that “You should never let go of hope” through her use of metaphors, symbolism, and denotation/connotation.

Chocked at the election of their next president, many Americans at the end of 2016 turned to social media petitions, pills, and the streets in protest. A century made a half ago, shocked at the assasunation of the sitting president who oversaw the reunification of a divided nation. Walk Whitman turned to poetry. He evlogized Abraham Lincoln as the fallen leader of the great ship of America, which he called a "vessel grim and daring", but for Whitman, poetry wasn't just expressing political lament; it was also a political force in itself.

The individual is portrayed by romantics in many different aspects, but all believing that an individual should think for them self. Ralph Waldo Emerson writes in his works of how people must do as they like and not follow in the shadow of others. Henry David Thoreau believes that people should think for themselves in respect to the government and rule for themselves. Henry Wadsworth Longfellow writes in his works of how people should seize the day and live life to its fullest, avoiding the fear of the future.

In “Hope is the thing with feathers” by Emily Dickinson, she creates a metaphor of hope through a bird; it is much like a bird that continues to fly inside each person of us. While we all experience some dark times, hope can offer some encouragements. And that the destroyer of hope causes pain and soreness that hurts them the most. I thought the poem is inspirational, because it motivates us by being optimistic and hope for the best.

This poem is similar to the other poem by Dickinson with the similar ABCB rhyme scheme, this patterns however uses a dash to interrupt the flow— of the

"Hope is a Thing with Feathers” and “O Captain! My Captain!” contain a similar scansion. Both have a predominantly

The poem is comprised of six stanzas, each having four lines, which suggests that each stanza has a short idea that supports and leads to the underlying theme of the poem. The length of the lines are very short and choppy as complete ideas or “sentences” get separated into multiple lines. As for syllables within each line, the poem contains a pattern that switches from eight syllables in one line, six syllables in the next, back to eight syllables in the next line,and so on. Throughout the poem, the first word of each line is capitalized as well as each noun which can slow the reader down, making them pause to consider the significance of the words rather than reading past it and breezing through the poem. Dashes are commonly used throughout the poem and are at the end of almost every line. Like the capitalizations, the dashes can make the reader pause and usher on to the next line. They can also be seen as connectors or even as strings, pulling you through the poem. The particular rhyme scheme is best described as ABCB, which is a set of four line stanzas in which the second and fourth lines rhyme. Not only does the rhyme tie the poem together, but it draws attention to some important words such as, "immortality.” However, Dickinson doesn’t strictly use exact rhyme in this poem. In fact, only the first and fifth stanzas rhyme in the ABCB scheme. For example, the lines in the fourth stanza which end in "chill" and "tulle". While these words do not exactly rhyme, the similarity in the 'l' sounds carry a near or slight rhyme,

“O Captain! My Captain!” is one of the most popular poems ever written by Walt Whitman. Upon the initial reading of this poem, one may perceive the poem to be about a loyal captain who leads his crew on a treacherous, but successful, voyage which ends in devastation. If interpreted literally this is the poem’s only meaning, but for those who look further there is an underlying story behind the words of Whitman. Whitman uses multiple literary elements throughout this poem in order to unmask the story of Abraham Lincoln’s journey and ultimate death as a result of the Civil War and his fight to end slavery.

In “Hope is the thing with feathers” the author characterizes hope as being caring and always being there when it's needed, which helps develop the theme of hope and perseverance. The following line, “And never stops at all”, helps characterize the bird in the poem as persevering. This piece of evidence shows that hope will always be there which characterization of caring. The line “That perches in soul”, gives the characterization of perseverance. This line is portraying the idea of hope always being with you, hence the line perching within you, or in your soul. The line “And sour must be the storm that could abash the little bird” characterizes hope as persevering. The line illustrates the bird as always being there even when times are tough. Even when one might think that there is no hope, hope will always be there. The quote “Yet never in extremity it asked a crumb-of me” characterize hope as being giving.The line shows how hope will never ask for anything in return and instead gives without expecting anything in return.

She uses a number of literary devices in the poem. One primary example of the figurative language that she uses is a the personifications do symbolism of hope. A symbol is an image that represents an abstraction. For example, a red rose may represent love, or a stone may represent hardheartedness. In “’Hope Is The Thing With Feathers,” the poet assigns hope the symbol of a ‘thing with feathers,’ more specifically a bird. Even though that, by the end of the poem, readers can definitely conclude that Dickinson used a metaphor by saying ‘hope is a bird,’ she does not make that clear until the very end. The metaphor began as only a “partial one: a ‘thing with feathers’ is not yet a bird, but some sort of object, not easily envisioned and defined only by the fact that it is feathered, that is, winged, capable of flight. It is a transient human experience, one that ‘perches’ in the soul but does not live there. It ‘sings the tune without the words,’ that is, a song in which rational, lexical meaning plays no role, while melody is all. Finally it ‘never stops at all’” (Leiter). The symbolism of saying that hope is a bird assists the reader in having a better understanding of how the virtue of human desire exists in side one’s soul, and is always singing – always alive – even when times get drastic. A bird is used to represent hope since “birds are often viewed as free and self-reliant, or as symbols of spirituality” (Rose and Ruby). The feathered fowl in this poem is “courageous and persevering, for it continues to share its song under even the most difficult conditions” (Rose and Ruby). Providing imagery of a bird also helps one to form connections as to what hope would act like if it were personified as said