Mark Crawford's Poem 'Broken Window'

The first stanza of the poem offers us with descriptions of the temporal and spatial dimensions the boy was situated in through the use of figures of speech, namely metaphor and metonymy. “[S]ky began burning” is a metaphor for the bright explosions and burning debris viewed from above, perhaps as a result of the ongoing war. On the other hand, the house can be seen as a metonymy for the people inside it. By the comparing this “house” to the birds in the eaves, the boy speaks of the house as a shelter or refuge for the people affected by the war, just like how birds find protection in the lower border of a roof overhanging a wall. Also, the

***The epigraph of Tennessee Williams' play A Streetcar Named Desire contains a quote from Hart Crane's poem The Broken Tower: "And so it was I entered the broken world /To trace the visionary company of love, its voice/An instant in the wind (I know not whither hurled)/But not for long to hold each desperate choice."***

This poem clearly represents the heart brokenness of a desperate man who had been shaded by the darkness of the piercing shock he experienced after he was forced to let go of his love, that was so dear to him. Although, he explains that with the love he presented to his significant other, it also brought hard times to their relationship, that caused her to be unhappy. The poet shows his difficult journey to successfully substain himself from her love.

He writes of a white veteran who approaches him while at the wall. With his effort to point out that it was a white veteran shows us that the speaker understands that the war didn’t just effect himself or African Americans, but all that were involved. He then uses some visual imagery to help us envision this white veteran and how he looked at the speaker by saying “his pale eyes/look through mine” (lines 26-27). Then, with the metaphor “I’m a window”, he expresses how, since being at the memorial wall, his self-perception has now lessened even more (line 27). Now he is neither stone nor flesh, but now a window through which this white veteran looks at the wall. He doesn’t even see the speaker, but obviously has his own harsh experiences of the war as he looks through the speaker at the wall. With this visual imagery and metaphoric language the speaker helps us understand how he feels about the war and the affects it’s had on him and all others that were involved.

When I first read this poem, it was in the book “The perks of being a wallflower” and after I read it I instantly fell in love with it and I did not know why. I think the poem shows the truth to how quickly life can change and the overwhelming sense many get by constantly seeking for approval from others. He looks for approval from his parents, and from his teachers. The constant repetition of achieving an A from his teacher is something he seeks when he feels his parents pulling away from

Hayden uses imagery to give the reader a better feel for what is going on. He uses sight and sound imagery. With the use of the words, “crashes, pleads and shrills”, the reader can almost see a vivid picture of what is happening. Hayden furthers the visual imagery by telling of the different plants the boy is running through trying to get away from the enraged woman who is beating him. Line ten and eleven describes the detachment the speaker (also the eyewitness and neighbor) places between himself and the injustice around him, “His tears are rainy weather to wound like memories.” The neighbor gazes outside his house to see what is happening and is extremely affected by them. He has always washed his hands of it by not intervening and by ignoring the problem. The child’s tears are compared to rainy weather, but the narrator knows that the boy will eventually cease to cry, just as the sun returns from behind a rain cloud after a storm, and the observer will be able to bury the memory

The poet utilizes a metaphor of a glass door with shutters to express how he is shut out of something that is supposed to be transparent. There is also irony with this because they are trying to block him out, but he can still see them clearly.

`In Robert Gray’s poems, he uses language to capture human experiences. In two of his poems; old house and late ferry, gray has effectively captured human experiences by his varies poetic languages and through insight and feeling. Throughout both texts late ferry and old house, gray’s main message in the poems, with his critical analysis, is the destruction of nature by mankind.

J. Kennedy poem Death of a window Washer explores the social side of human nature with its poetry. The irony of this works attests more of the apathetic nature of people rather than a socializing community or another urban area. “He dropped the way you'd slam an obstinate sash. His split belt like a shade unrolling, flapping”. Instead of the sentences being overly flowery like Goldberger’s essay, they are direct and blunt which gives this poem its own eye-catching effect. Additionally, there is a common misinterpretation that the nameless, window washer committed suicide by jumping off the ledge. This misinterpretation could arise from the window washer’s death being viewed by a person in the city or because the individuals receive more attention in the story “He'd made the city pause briefly to suffer”. Initially, readers believe the washer’s death pains the city. However, by the next line “His taking ample room for once. In rather a tedious while the rinsed street, left to dry”. the citizens are more affected by the problems the window washer caused than actual care or concern for him. His untimely death is as bothersome as stain on a shirt; hard to rinse off. They are left with displeasure of dealing with his death. The people “suffer” as they impatiently wait for the removal of his corpse. “His legacy is mute: one final gleaming pane of glass”. Why is his legacy mute? He was a human being that contributed to society; he cleaned a public space. If someone

The speaker is visiting the Vietnam Veterans Memorial. In the beginning of the poem, he is trying to hold back his tears. He is trying to remain strong and brave. When he is at the Vietnam Veteran’s Memorial, he comes across the name Andrew Johnson. As the readers of this poem, I have no clue who Andrew Johnson is. Andrew Johnson could be someone that was close to him during the war. At the Vietnam Veterans Memorial, you can see your reflection through the walls. The walls at the memorial are how the narrator speaks about his reflections and what he can see through the walls. The very last few lines of the poem are when he sees a reflection of a white vet in the Vietnam Veterans Memorial.

One of the techniques used by Harwood throughout the poem is imagery, being able to give the reader mental pictures of the events occurring, some of these include the door of heavy glass closing in lines 25- 27, and also the crumpling of the face, the smile, the tears and the linen table cloth. Harwood also uses mood as a technique to engage the reader and expresses

The poem can be interpreted as an allegory on how the war has impacted the veteran, and how the wall is not simply a wall. The allegory begins with the speaker looking at the black granite wall. There is a clear division between the actual visit and the veteran’s struggle at the wall. Since his “black face fades” into the wall, it shows that he is one with the “black granite.” He, alongside the wall, is evidence of history. He is living proof of what has happened in the war, and the names show the result of the war. To emphasize this connection, the veteran describes himself as “stone” and “flesh.” Since the veteran is still alive, he views himself as the flesh, but believes he should be the stone. Just like he is impacted by the wall, he believes that other people feel the same impact. The veteran believes this when he mentions “names shimmer on a woman’s blouse” (l. 19). The names on the woman’s blouse show, that as each individual person goes to the wall, a special connection happens between the two. It is almost like the people become one with the wall, sharing their feelings with one another. However, the connection is lost as the woman “walks away the names stay on the wall” (ll. 20-21). Once a person leaves the wall, that connection is gone. People leave and return back to “reality.” However, this is not the case with the veteran. This vision states that the veteran

In the context of the entire poem, what is the meaning and significance of the last eight lines of the poem?

It is said that an individual can do very well when they enjoy what they do. That is

For instance, the poem displays the difference between the two characters of what they look like in the poem. On one side, the black person is wearing clothes that makes him look like a mugger, waiting to strike. This side of the story portrays of how poverty affects a person, and most commonly a black person. It also creates a barrier of how people would view them, in this case, that person would be labeled as someone dangerous. In any case, with the lack of money and the color of your skin, results in your image being considered bad.