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The Planners(Boey Kim Cheng)-Analysis

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THE PLANNERS

The poet of the poem “The Planners”, Boey Kim Cheng, uses many techniques, including but not limited to an extended metaphor and personification, to effectively communicate his views on the planners. In the beginning of the poem, the poet states what the planners do. “They plan. They build. All spaces are gridded,” shows that the planners are very organized. The word “permutations” shows that each space is tightly packed to its full potential by the planners. “The buildings are in alignment with the roads”, and the reference to mathematics, since mathematics can create a one and only solution to any problem, shows that the planners have only made one possible outcome for everything they build. One choice. One perfection. …show more content…

The planners are first said to “erase the flaws” and the “blemishes of the past”. The word “flaws” show that the planners are trying to make a perfect world, one without any mistakes or anything within their idea of “imperfection”. The word “blemishes” are usually related to artificial flaws, and mistakes, and so the “blemishes of the past” may just as well be the mistakes that they made in history. The also knock off “useless blocks”. In the planner’s opinions, the blocks may be useless, but to someone else with a different perspective, the blocks may be still of use and does not need to be destroyed. The poet refers to the dentists by saying that the planners knock of blocks with “dental dexterity”. This shows how negative the poet thinks about the planners, destroying things that might be still of use to someone else, similar to the saying of “one man’s trash is another’s treasure.”

The planners are said to plug the gaps. The word “plugged” usually mean that it is blocked and nto allowed to come in or go out. From the previous stanza stating perfection of the planners, we can infer that the “gaps” are the creativity of people. The have built and planned the city with such uniformity that the people that live there are under their spell and have no more creativity. The creativity is plugged and blocked, with “gleaming gold”, which, as gold is considered a rare and perfect element, may suggest that

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