preview

To Katherine At Fourteen Months Essay

Decent Essays

“To Katherine: At Fourteen Months” by Joelle Biele is a mother’s declaration to her one-year-old daughter. The author, Joelle Biele blends the simplistic world of a 14-month-old Katherine and creates descriptive narrative of a child on a quest for constant discovery. Through the authors expressive language Katherine’s plight shifts from that of a child and blends to treat Katherine as some sort of Celestial mad scientist trying to understand the world as she grows. A unique union of diction, symbolism, and metaphors are structured by author Biele to pronounce the action of a fourteen-month baby Katharine. The poems title “To Katherine at fourteen months is structured in such a manner that allows it to be read in two parts. The first part, …show more content…

Only a mother could take a child throwing a plate and relate it to the laws of motion as the author did in lines 3-4 “the dynamics of the occasional plates observed the principles governing object in motion an object at rest”. This maternal tone that the author creates from the very beginning influences other elements within the poem. The setting of the poem is very multidimensional. The setting could be perceived to be in the present or could be the reader’s childhood. The imagery built by the setting, however does force reader to look at the curiosity that they held in their childhood. We as readers are forced to think of the expectations and curiosity we had for objects because itmust react to our touch which is idea we as reader share with Katharine in lines 7-9 " ". The further displays the setting and imagery in lines 5-7. These lines show of the author flavorful diction “Chinese Hong" " rage like a penny" furthermore these adjectives and verbs show the authors progression in describing Katherine's actions. The reader and Katherine I no longer dealing with spoons and plates we are now dealing with Chinese gong.the author progression in word choice and setting go even farther in the last sentences we move from metaphor to describe sound to metaphor that compare

Get Access