Men And Women In Sei Shonagon's The Pillow Book

Poetry is not only a literary work but is a piece of art. Humans are emotional beings, and poetry allows one to express their emotions in a way that no other form can. Poetry is similar to a museum containing the sum of human experience. Poetry has a significant impact on the human mind, body, and soul. In a society which is increasingly demanding, poetry is more significant than ever. Paper matches by Paulette Jiles is a perfect example of how poetry is used to convey a societal issue. The speaker of the poem is a young girl who questions why her uncles are able to enjoy life and go outside while her aunts are working inside. She realizes that this is normal and is the role of women. Throughout the poem, the speaker becomes angry with gender roles and the portrayal of women. Traditional gender roles are discriminatory against women as seen in water literal imagery, the metaphor to small animal rages, and the simile to paper matches.

The poem "A Song of Changgan" is very poignant, as it starts with a bashful girl who does not even smile around her husband and ends with her almost heartbroken, as her husband is far away. The poem shows the different stages of the relationship of the speaker and her husband, and it is an excellent example of long-distance relationships before modern communication systems.

Poetry is oftentimes associated with the subjects of love and romance. Poets throughout the ages have used this medium to express their deepest emotions in the most eloquent of ways. Whether the poet is a man or woman is irrelevant. Poets of both genders have succeeded in expressing a heartfelt love to another with a poetic language that speaks volumes in a relatively short amount of text. Two poets from two separate eras each wrote a poem with just such a theme. Anne Bradstreet in “To My Dear and Loving Husband” and Edgar Allan Poe in “Annabel Lee” created magic by writing these poems that express a love for another that transcends time and place.

This poem by Charlotte Mew tells a story in which a farmer marries a very young girl who could not be less ready to marry. The maid in this poem is abused throughout the poem by her so called husband who does not treat her even as a human. Her marriage arranged at a young age the girl is forced into adult duties and actions much too early. This cause many issues to her mental health and her trust towards other humans. The farmer, as the narrator, uses several similes throughout the poem comparing the maid to a rabbit. This shows how he views her and why he treats her like he does in the poem. The six uneven stanzas allows Mew to express her intentions not limited to another's style. This allows for amazing line placement throughout the poem, and the only form she follows throughout the poem is iambic tetrameter. There is no rhyme scheme allowing Mew to have freedom like the girl so much desires. In “The Farmer’s Bride”, Charlotte Mew uses irregular rhyme and form with iambic tetrameter, as well as thorough imagery and comparison to show the broken marriage in this poem.

When you read a poem you can come from it with an overall feeling and figure out by context clues how the author’s feelings were of the subject as well. “It’s a Woman’s World” written by Eavan Boland goes through the struggles and restraints society hold to being a woman. The speaker had a complex with it being a “Women’s word” and you can see that through diction, imagery and symbolism.

Poetry is oftentimes associated with the subjects of love and romance. Poets throughout the ages have used this medium to express their deepest emotions in the most eloquent of ways. Whether the poet is a man or woman is irrelevant. Poets of both genders have succeeded in expressing a heartfelt love to another with a poetic language that speaks volumes in a relatively short amount of text. Two poets from two separate eras each wrote a poem with just such a theme. Anne Bradstreet in “To My Dear and Loving Husband” and Edgar Allan Poe in “Annabel Lee” created magic by writing these poems that express a love for another that transcends time and place.

The connection from text-to-text, text-to-self and text-to-world create more appeal to other people that wants to learn more about the poem through the help of connection with other thing than just a poem being. Having the connection with each text, man and through the world for the poem to be translated from each perspective of the people around the world. Having so much translation and point of views for a single poem can help other people in the other places and can explain to other people what it truly mean.

Women were expected to stay in their place and be good housewives. Their days were meant to be occupied with cooking, cleaning, and raising the children. Their opinions were not solicited nor readily welcomed in male dominated circles of influence. Women poets were not treated or viewed any differently no matter how gifted or talented they were. They were expected to be women, wives, and mothers, first and foremost. Male poets and other literary artists were known to be carefree and devoted only to their writings. There was no time for entangling themselves with the cares of day to day domestic

Poetry has a role in society, not only to serve as part of the aesthetics or of the arts. It also gives us a view of what the society is in the context of when it was written and what the author is trying to express through words. The words as a tool in poetry may seem ordinary when used in ordinary circumstance. Yet, these words can hold more emotion and thought, however brief it was presented.

For as long as it can be remembered people have used multiple forms of literature in order to gain knowledge, entertain, and even express a certain idea. Poetry is in fact one of those forms of literature, and before people began to write it, it was known to be told verbally by many. A person would tell a tale and those who listened would memorize it, what eventually caused poetry to spread around. Still to this day, many come to fall in love with the magic poetry possesses. It is the writer’s decision to either have a specific rhythm to it or just have a simple list of words. This essay argues that poetry is a creative way of expressing one's emotions and that it should be, not only preserved, but celebrated, even by those who have not considered themselves poetry fans in the past.

I will consider the way in which the two poets deal with the idea of love as timeless.I will also explore themes of authenticity and identity in their poems about love. In addition I will consider the extent to which their gender may have affected their view of love.

The famous Greek historian Plutarch once said: “Painting is silent poetry, and poetry is painting that speaks”. He couldn’t have been more astute. By analysing poetry, we are not just appreciating the soul of the poet and what drove him/her, but we also come to comprehend the spirit of the period that the poet was writing.

There are many different themes that can be used to make a poem both successful and memorable. Such is that of the universal theme of love. This theme can be developed throughout a poem through an authors use of form and content. “She Walks in Beauty,” by George Gordon, Lord Byron, is a poem that contains an intriguing form with captivating content. Lord Byron, a nineteenth-century poet, writes this poem through the use of similes and metaphors to describe a beautiful woman. His patterns and rhyme scheme enthrall the reader into the poem. Another poem with the theme of love is John Keats' “La Belle Dame sans Merci,” meaning “the beautiful lady without mercy.” Keats, another nineteenth-century writer, uses progression and compelling

he joined the armed forces and wrote several of his lesser known poems. They all included a romantic theme which could be a result of being isolated from the opposite sex. The general subject or goal of the Romantic era was to compare the beauty of nature to an everyday object or person and to create a snapshot of the scene being described. “[Romanticism] Shuns the artificiality of civilization and seeks unspoiled nature, prefers youthful innocence to educated sophistication, and contemplates nature’s beauty as a path to spiritual and moral development,” (Langley 2-5) The importance of the comparison between the river is huge in this poem because the way the river is described as a “bright, clear flow”. It shows that this river in particular is special. The majority of rivers are muddy and murky which suggests that the maiden has a sense of purity about her.

The poem “How Do I Love Thee”, by Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and “What Lips My Lips Have Kissed”, by Edna Vincent Millay are both well-known poems that both have themes of love. (LIT, Kirszner & Mandell, Pg. 490). In both poems the poet helps the reader experience a lot of emotion with the use of certain words. There are speakers in both poems. In Mrs. Browning’s poem, the speaker is undefined, leaving open that the speaker could be a he or she. Millay’s poem which is written in first person, the speaker is more defined leading the reader to believe it is a she who is talking about love in the past tense. Both poems are sonnets written with fourteen lines, and written in Italian style. When comparing these poems we will be looking at the use of rhyme scheme and metaphors and how they were used to express emotions in these two sonnet poems.