“Meine weissen ara haben safrangelbe kronen” is the eighth poem from Stefan George’s Das Buch der hängenden Gärten. It is followed by two of the collection’s four poems with individual titles, “Vorbereitungen” (Preparations) and “Friedensabend” (Peaceful Evening), and the fifteen poems in the central section of the Buch that George’s friend and muse Ida Coblenz called Semiramis-Lieder and that were set to music by Arnold Schönberg.
In the poem, the speaker tells about his macaws that sleep in their cage. They never sing or fly, but according to the speaker, they dream of the date trees that are far away. Waters (2005) calls this “another image of royal and exotic birds that varies this recurring picture of a painful and insuperable divide between art and life. […] Rare, isolated from the world, crowned, and arranged “in schlanken ringen,” the parrots epitomize a realm of formal aesthetics […] [D]ozing, they nod, as if assenting to their confinement for beauty’s sake.”
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This shape points at the two middle verses, which emphasise the macaws’ passivity. Enjambments connect the second to fourth and the seventh and eighth verses. Hence, the flow stops in the middle of the poem, especially in the fourth verse which is interrupted by a caesura. Both the fourth and fifth verse are not only end-stopped but also stressed on the last syllable and thus further highlighted. The rhyme scheme of two rhyming couplets enclosing an enclosed rhyme (aabccbdd) points again towards the middle of the poem in addition to mirroring the birds’
In the book Gabriel: A Poem by Edward Hirsch, he structure the elegy starting at the funeral home where his son Gabriel lays, he then is remembering all the events form Gabriel’s life leading up to his death. Edward Hirsch uses a three line ten stanza on each page, without punctuation. This is to signify that the starting and stopping of punctuation cannot unpack the hardship of outliving your child. The three line stanzas imply the book’s most painful suggestion that, “The dead are no more than how we remember them”.
There is alliteration in the stanzas of 3 and 6 “blade beak” and claws clutching”. This poem also has a rhythm to it; the stanzas are not constructed in that unbalanced way in which it’s hard to keep flowing feel to the literature.
John Updike arranges structure in the poem to create the specific feeling of having one’s heart change from seeing something beautiful. The beginning of the poem starts with a couplet that describes the setting; a man-made golf course “on Cape Ann in October” (1). Enjambment is integrated throughout the poem to surprise the reader and create anticipation. For example, in lines 8-9, enjambment adds tension as the narrator describes what he sees in the sky. The entire poem is free verse, this emphasizes the flight of the birds and how nature has no true rhythm. By using free verse, the reader is unable to predict what will happen next and uncertainty is added. Without the free verse, the poem would feel unrelaxed and harsh. In lines 50-1, Updike changes the word order to startle the reader and conclude the poem in an interesting and memorable way. The poet manipulates the structure to provide a suspenseful mood and make the reader feel interested in the storyline.
The rhyme scheme in the second stanza ddeefg brings us to an end in the texts' relation to the Earth's cool breeze just as the rhyme pattern discontinues from its previous flow, aabbcc.
The last effect of this unusual stanza is to create a turning point within the poem. The turning point starts in the final rhyming couplet of the fifth stanza where the pace is reduced by the use of alliteration and the trimetric line.
The poem also uses end rhyme to add a certain rhythm to the poem as a whole. And the scheme he employs: aabbc, aabd, aabbad. End rhyme, in this poem, serves to effectively pull the reader through to the end of the poem. By pairing it with lines restricted to eight syllables. The narrator creates an almost nursery-rhyme like rhythm. In his third stanza however, his last line, cutting short of eight syllables, stands with an emphatic four syllables. Again, in the last stanza, he utilizes the same technique for the last line of the poem. The narrator’s awareness of rhyme and syllable structure provides the perfect bone structure for his poem’s rhythm.
She also presents a slight rhythm to the reading that allows for smooth reading. In keeping with her open form, there is no set scheme to the rhyme pattern. However, there is a single ending sound constantly repeated without a set pattern throughout the work. She also connects pairs of lines at random just for the sake of making connections to make that particular stanza flow. At the same time, she chose blatantly not to rhyme in certain parts to catch the reader’s attention.
Apart from that, the poem consists of a series of turns that reflect different parts of the speaker’s feelings and the experiences he had. The significance of these turns is made possible through the use of stanza breaks. For example, the first
Imagery was also used in the poem. I found that the yellow in the first line represented that the future the writer was facing was bright and warm regardless of his choice. The undergrowth was, as undergrowth in any forest, damp and dank smelling, but not necessarily unpleasant, just something that the writer would have to face. The image of traveling through a forest also brings to mind thoughts of birds in flight, chirping and singing. Squirrels dashing through trees, rustling leaves and dropping the occasional acorn or nut also create an image of sight and sound. The sun reflecting through the trees, casting shadows and creating pockets of warm and cool air and the occasional breeze stirring through the trees are also brought to mind by this poem. The end of the poem brings to me
Schoenberg’s libretto is drawn from Otto Hartleben’s German translation of the Belgian poet Albert Giraud’s Pierrot lunaire. In its original form, the work consists of fifty rondels (an antiquated poetic form structurally reliant on textural repetition) describing various commedia scenes and happenings. The poems vary widely in content, some depicting country idylls,
It contains stanzas that have six lines each accompanied by an A,B,C,B,B,B rhyme scheme for all stanzas and the first line of each having a rhyme such as “Once upon a midnight dreary, while I pondered weak and weary” (1). Poe’s diction and tone forces the reader to look deep into it for meaning. Imagery is prevalent in the first two stanzas as Poe sets the mood for this intriguing poem. This is indicated by the use of words like “ weak and weary”, “bleak December” (1,7). The first line contains the literary device known as assonance with “weak and weary”
The poem begins with the poet noticing the beauty around her, the fall colors as the sun sets “Their leaves and fruits seemed painted, but was true, / Of green, of red, of yellow, mixed hue;” (5-6). The poet immediately relates the effects of nature’s beauty to her own spiritual beliefs. She wonders that if nature here on Earth is so magnificent, then Heaven must be more wonderful than ever imagined. She then views a stately oak tree and
The poet orders his listener to behold a “solitary Highland lass” reaping and singing by herself in a field. He says that anyone passing by should either stop here, or “gently pass” so as not to disturb her. As she “cuts and binds the grain” she “sings a melancholy strain,” and the valley overflows with the beautiful, sad sound. The speaker says that the sound is more welcome than any chant of the nightingale to weary travelers in the desert, and that the cuckoo-bird in spring never sang with a voice so thrilling. Impatient, the poet asks, “Will no one tell me what she sings?” He speculates that her song might be about “old, unhappy, far-off things, / And battles long ago,” or that it might be humbler, a simple song about “matter of today.” Whatever she sings about, he says, he listened “motionless and still,” and as he traveled up the
The poem is separated into two parts, each with sixteen lines, and is loosely based on an iambic pentameter metre. The rhyme scheme is ABAB throughout the poem, with the noticeable exception of the last four lines of part II, in which it changes to
The first line also begins to unify sound within the poem as consonance is evident in the “s” sound of “its close” (Lovecraft). Moving onward to the second line, we see proper alliteration in “golden glory” (Lovecraft). The second line also contains some symbolism as Lovecraft writes the “golden glory”, to be the sun moving below the skyline in an open expanse of land. The third line contains a triple form of alliteration with “soft, stealing shadows” (Lovecraft). The third line contains a sense of calming mood as the imagery of growing shadows quietly envelope the landscape. Finally, the stanza closes “to mellowing landscape, and to calming sea” (l.4 Lovecraft); this final line is full of imagery as the land is becoming calmer with days’ end. The stanza also begins the simple rhyme scheme of “abab” to be seen through the rest of the stanzas. This stanza as a whole brings the poem to a start of what the sun offers as it sets off to illuminate the rest of the