Four Skinny Trees Metaphors

Often, an author uses figurative language to build upon the story and to create a more meaningful message. The text,“A Private Talk with Holly” uses symbolism to express the main idea that

Jane Hirshfield connects to nature at her home in Marin County, California this is where she gets her inspiration for her poems. Hirshfield published “Tree” in 2000 as a free verse poem, divided into 4 stanzas and 4 sentences to convey the nature world. The poem represents a “young redwood” (line 2) growing near a house, near a kitchen window. The redwood is already scraping against the window frame of the house, reminding the reader of the “foolish” (line 1) idea of letting it grow there. Humans were created to be one with nature, but as they evolved as a species, they were obligated to choose between the materialistic world or the world of nature.

The diction in the excerpt is an essential component to the dramatization of the plot’s central incident. Jewett uses rich language to intensify the simple nature of the main character Sylvia’s journey up a “great pine-tree.” For example, in describing the tree, the narrator uses personification as he mentions the “huge tree asleep yet in the paling moonlight.” The use of personification harkens back to those universal moments in childhood in which everything alive had human feelings, and creates an emotional attachment between the reader and the tree. Jewett also uses other figurative language, like similes, to relate the grandeur of the tree to the audience. She writes, “It [the tree] was like a great main-mast to the voyaging earth…” In comparing the tree to the great mast of a ship, the author invokes feelings of awe at its size.

Within the first few lines of The Glass Roses, the setting is established as a cold and inhospitable environment. The bitter Canadian landscape is often battered by howling winds and enveloped by a thick layer of snow. This harsh physical landscape closely mirrors Stephen’s perception of the icy-cold stoics he works with. These men, who are all well-versed lumbermen, have “humped backs and ox-like shoulders”, the “huskiest and most solemn” of which is Stephen’s own father. These characteristics starkly contrast Stephen’s own “willowy fifteen-year-old body”. “Sometimes he wondered if he suffered from a wasting disease. He almost hoped that this was so, for then his weakness would be thought less shameful”. At the outset of this short story,

In “Marigolds” a young girl is growing up during the Great Depression. For Lizabeth, the narrator, everyday is a challenge. As she transitions from an innocent, naive child to an aware, yet unsure young woman, the smooth road she’s been traveling on suddenly becomes bumpy and unfamiliar when a fit of anger taken out on her neighbor marks Lizabeth’s growing up. “All the smoldering emotions of that summer swelled in me and burst- the great need for my mother who was never there, the hopelessness of our poverty and degradation, the bewilderment of being neither child nor woman and yet both at once…”, (Collier, “Marigolds”). All of the emotions that Lizabeth has been holding in spill out of her in an audacious, violent action that will exile her childhood; the destroying of Miss Lottie’s prized marigolds.When Lizabeth realizes with remorse what she’s done, she gains the heavy burden of adulthood. “In that humiliating moment I looked beyond myself and into the depths of another person. This was the beginning of compassion, and one cannot have both compassion and innocence”, (Collier, “Marigolds”). When Lizabeth conveys that Miss Lottie had planted marigolds as a show of passion and hope, she becomes compassionate towards Miss Lottie, ridding her of her childish innocence. While “Hard on the Gas” is minimally worded, the meaning of the poem speaks volumes. The poem conveys growing up, and the fact that the road to adulthood is not, in fact, smooth. “Rush, rest, rush, rest”,

You never really understand a person until you consider things from his point of view-” “-until you climb into his skin and walk around in it.” (Lee 30).

The imagery in the poem “35/10” also conveys the speaker’s wistfulness and jealousy for her daughter’s youth. The speaker describes her daughter as, “a moist/ precise flower on the tip of a cactus” (9-10) while she says, “my skin shows/ its dry pitting” (8-9). These phrases paint an image of the daughter as blooming and new, whereas the speaker is wilting and used. The word moist is associated with youthfulness and the word dry is associated with old age. The speaker’s use of the contrasting words moist and dry also allows the reader to use visual and tactile senses to picture the physical differences between the

The setting of Alice Walkers short story” The Flowers” is important for us, the readers to obtain a perspective of how life was like growing up for a 10 year old African American girl by the name of Myop. The title of the story is “The Flowers.” When you think about flowers, you instantly compare them to being beautiful, pure, and innocent. The title of the “The Flowers” is a symbolism that correlates to Myop who is the protagonist of the story. Myop is just like a flower in the beginning of the story. She’s a pure and innocent child but that pure innocence changes when she discovers something that’ll change her life forever.

In Toni Morrison's novel Beloved, each character holds a special connection to trees and each places different meaning in them. The motif of trees and plants represent a calming force, escape from hardship, and circle of life that can heal the wounds of slavery. Paul D and Sethe are two characters in particular who place unique meaning in plants and use them as a way to escape their painful memories and the horrors of slavery.

In Mary Oliver’s poem The Black Walnut Tree, she depicts a deep meaning in the relationship between a black walnut tree and the family through the synthesis of poetic devices and figurative language. A debate between mother and daughter, on the issue of selling the walnut tree to pay mortgage. A transition occurs going from the literal sense of needing money, to the tree symbolizing their family tree and ancestors. Metaphors and symbolism spark a new meaning to the conflict associated with the tree, arising a new issue of the shame and betrayal that would be if they were to sell the tree.

The strength less dead are the athletes whose “name died before the man”(20). Housman emphasizes through the imagery that it is better to do while one is still remembered since the glory will stay with him and not fade away. “To An Athlete Dying Young” glorifies the athlete through the use of imagery while “Ex-Basketball Player” uses it to emphasize the athlete’s fading glory.

Most of the time there is a moment in life where one realizes they have lost all innocence and gained some compassion.  “Marigolds” shows how one young girl transferred from a child to young adult through her life experiences.  Throughout this story another young, but at the same time old in her prime, lady’s experiences are revealed:  the author’s.  In this short story, “Marigolds,” Eugenia Collier’s subconscious is unmasked through symbolism, diction, and Lizabeth’s actions.

The short story “Greenleaf” by Flannery O’Connor tells of Mrs. May, an old, bitter, and selfish woman. She thinks badly of everyone around her, including her own two sons. It also compares her family to that of the Greenleaf family, who Mrs. May sees as inferior to her. O’Connor unveils the story of Mrs. May and her demise through the use of point of view, character, and symbolism. She uses the third person omniscient view to give the reader a sense of Mrs. May’s character, and the symbols of the bull, and the conflict between the bull and Mrs. May to show Mrs. May’s destruction as well as give the story a deeper meaning of God’s grace.

Ann Michael’s did a great job of making women laying on a beech, an everyday situation, very unique. She did an excellent job due to the fact that she included numerous examples of figurative imagery. This includes the use of metaphors, similes, and personification. When Ann Michael’s used these figures of speech, she explained the situation by indirectly comparing it to other common concepts. Using these figures of speech allows the readers to better visualize what is happening in their head and understand the text to a greater extent. Like mentioned before, Ann Michael used several of these figures of speech, making her everyday situation extremely interesting and enjoyable to read. Some examples include: “Light chooses white sails, the

‘’I saw my life branching out before me like the green fig tree in the story. From the tip of every branch, like a fat purple fig, a wonderful future beckoned and winked. One fig was a husband and a happy home and children, and another fig was a famous poet and another fig was a brilliant professor… I couldn 't make up my mind which of the figs I would choose. I wanted each and every one of them, but choosing one meant losing all the rest, and, as I sat there, unable to decide, the figs began to wrinkle and go black, and, one by one, they plopped to the ground at my feet.” (p. 73).