Sharon Olds Essay

Casey Hopkins Ms. Kristen ENGL 101 9/16/15 On the Subway The Poem “On the Subway” by Sharon Old speaks on the ideals of social injustice through her use of literary techniques like Diction, Imagery Sharon Olds uses imagery throughout her poem to convey the difference between the African-American boy and the white woman. In the poem the speaker refers to the “murderous beams of the nation’s heart” and how he soaks up the beams like “black cotton”(24-25). The use of the word cotton is meant to

birth, puberty, marriage, and death. Sharon Olds gave her poems title "Rite of Passage" because in this poem she describes the state of adolescence and the rites of passage that lead to adulthood. Olds wrote about young boys waiting to be men. The spiker, who is the birthday boy's mother, describing the veiled adults in the children that arrive to her son’s party, "as the guests arrive at my son's party." The author wrote, "short men, men in a first grade," Olds chose "first grade" as a symbol of

love?” (Line 1-2) This is the first question asked by Sharon Olds in her poem “Sex Without Love.” In today’s world, it is very common for two human beings to engage in sexual activity without sharing an emotional or intellectual connection with one another. Sharon Olds is a poet who is well known for creating very personal and emotional works of literature about family and relationship matters. The speaker of “Sex Without Love” could be Olds herself, but it could also be any person who shares the

it is very frustrating when you read something and you cannot grasp what exactly the author is trying to put across. Some authors, like Sharon Olds, use examples of real life experiences to try and explain something that is also happening in real life. After reading the preceding ten lines of the poem, I thought to myself that I had understood clearly what Sharon was saying. However, after getting to the tenth line, I got very confused. This prompted me to sit down, read the poem again keenly while

Though “Parents' Day” by Sharon Olds focuses on the admirable side of the parents and “Say You Love Me” by Molly Peacock focuses on the miserable, awful side of the parents, both poems uses imagery, figurative language (simile) and tone to bring richness and clarity to their texts. To begin, Sharon Olds and Molly Peacock use of imagery helps compare and contrast the appearance of parents. In “Parents' Day,” Olds stated “Sometimes she would have braids around her head like a

tension, and supremacy. The contrasts between the black boy and white woman represents the inequality that exists between high and low class citizens, not to mention white people and minorities. Sharon Olds uses devices such as tone, imagery, and organization to portray and amplify these differences. Olds begins the poem first by describing the black boys attire. The fact that he doesn’t have good shoes portray the image of a low class citizen. As the poem continues, it’s not long before the speaker

Sharon Olds’ “Sex Without Love” is one of her many published poems. “Sex Without Love” was first published in 1984 through a collection of poems in her second book The Dead and the Living. Since then, even educational textbooks, all across the nation have featured Olds’ poems for student analysis. Reported in an essay, Literary Critic Ann D. Garbett states, Olds was born in San Francisco, California on November 19, 1942. Olds grew up in an unstable home, with her alcoholic father, mother, abusive

"The Race" by Sharon Olds is an uneasy poem about the situations a daughter has to pass in order to reach her father. The poem is broken into what seems fear and retribution. In the beginning of the poem the author addresses the characters situation, " . . . When I got to the airport I rushed up to the desk, bought a ticket . . . said my father would not live through the night . . . flight was cancelled." Through these five lines the poem repeatedly states 'flight cancelled' accompanied with her

In Sharon Olds’s poem, “The Victims”, the commonality of divorce within families is discussed, specifically focusing on the fact that the children are critically impacted by the actions of their father. For instance, the speakers narrate that when their father was fired from his job, the child grinned, “...the way people grinned when / Nixon’s helicopter lifted off the South / Lawn for the last time” (6-7). The allusion of Nixon’s authoritative figure as president, who is distrusted by the citizens

“On the Subway” Analysis Essay Poets often bring together two bookending ideas in contrast to convey a broader view of the world. Sharon Olds is no different in “On the Subway.” In the poem, Olds places the opposites of black and white in a contained section of a much wider spectrum. Olds uses juxtaposition quite a bit in this poem to further highlight the immediate differences between the man and the speaker. She introduces him with a description of his shoes; black and laced in white. This first