Poetry Unit Goal #1
Goal #1: To better understand and apply the language of poetry (i.e., the devices poets use and how or why they use them)
Please read a poem of your choice and comment on one of the poetic devices in it. Use this list of poetic devices as a resource. Post your comment on the class discussion page.For example: I read Seamus Heaney's "Digging" and noticed a simile in the first stanza comparing a pen to a gun. It makes me think about how words can be used as weapons.
I read, “The Bells” by Edgar Allen Poe. I read that he is well known for using onomatopoeia in his famous poems. One line of the poem states, “How they clang, and clash, and roar!” With him adding the two ands in the line, he wants to frighten the reader and make them wonder as to what other form of this literary device is coming next. That is a very good touch to the already spooky poem that he wrote.
ReplyDeleteI read a blurry photograph by Martha Ronk's. I found imagery in the way the poet gets the reader to see the object he is just able not to see it just keeps sliping away.
ReplyDeleteI read Elizabeth Bishop's "The Fish" and noticed a visual imagery comparing the fish's brown skin and ancient wallpaper. I think it helps the reader realize that the fish has gone through a lot, which might contribute to why she let the fish go.
ReplyDeleteI read "Dreams" by Langston Hughes and noticed he combined personification and metaphors to emphasize his point. It makes me realize how comparing intangibles to our life makes them seem closer and more significant.
ReplyDeleteI read “Still I Rise” by Maya Angelo and I noticed a simile, “But still, like dust, I’ll rise”. I think Angelou is using this comparison to emphasize that she strongly believes in what she is doing, and nothing will stop her.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Rose That Grew From Concrete” by Tupac. The rose is personified in the poem when it says, “...it learned to walk without having feet”. He used personification to show that even though the rose is so small and seemingly insignificant, it does matter.
ReplyDeleteI read the poem "Tulips" by A.E. Stallings and I noticed personification in the line "Something about their burnt-out hearts". Tulips are plants so they don't have hearts like humans. I think A.E. Stallings used this device to show his connection with tulips because by giving them human characteristics, he demonstrates how he can relate to them.
ReplyDeleteI read “Heroic Simile” by Akira Kurosawa. A poetic device in this poem is a simile, where the poet writes “he fell straight as a pine”. This is a simile, because he is using like or as to compare something in his poem to something else to make his point.
ReplyDeleteI read "Because I could not stop for death" by Emily Dickinson. It has an ABCB rhyme scheme, with the exception of the third quatrain, whose second and fourth lines end with ring and sun respectively.
ReplyDeleteI read the poem The Rose that Grew from the Concrete by Tupac. The literary device used in this poem is a metaphor.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop. The poetic device I found was a simile. “Here and there
ReplyDeletehis brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper” She explained the fish’s skin with “like” so it’s not a metaphor.
I read "The Road Not Taken" By: Robert Frost. The poem followed the ABAAB rhyme scheme. It also had examples of assonance and alliteration in the poem.
ReplyDeleteI read “Homework Machine by Shel Silverstein. I noticed that one of the poetic device heavily used in it is rhyming couplets. I think this was used to give the poem a more playful tone as rhyming does.
ReplyDeleteI read Evie Shockley’s “women’s voting rights are at one hundred (but who’s counting?)” and noticed metaphor in the lines “one vote is an opinion/with a quiet legal force :/a barely audible beep/in the local traffic” which emphasizes that while a vote does have an impact, its a small one, one that can get lost in the crowd and go unheard.
ReplyDeleteI read The Pied Piper of Hamelin by Robert Browning. In my opinions, he used onomatopoeia to make the verses seem more dramatic, but playful.
ReplyDeleteI read "Tulips" by A.E. Stallings and noticed that the author personified tulips several times throughout the poem. One line in particular that caught my eye, was when the author combined personification and a paradox in saying, "Parading finishes like starts" meaning that tulips hold themselves high, and remain beautiful even when they're about to die.
ReplyDeleteI read “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins. I noticed that he used alliteration. An example is in this following line, “It gathers to a greatness, like th ooze of oil.” The poet placed two words beginning with the same letter near one another.
ReplyDeleteI read "The true meaning of life" by Pat A Fleming, and I saw a clear and interesting metonymy. Fleming wrote, "And how much more kindness, And love I can show, Before the Lord tells me, It's my time to go." The lord telling her it is her time to go is obviously referring to death, but she makes it seem less like a tragedy of death and more like a peaceful passing, which I liked.
ReplyDeleteI read "The Enkindled Spring" by D. H. Lawrence. The poem is a quatrain because it has 3 stanzas, each with 4 lines that rhyme in a ABAB pattern. Additionally, throughout the poem, Lawrence compares Spring to a green bonfire, which is an example of a metaphor.
ReplyDeleteI read "Tulips" by A. E. Stallings. There are many examples of metaphors, similes and personification throughout the poem. The line "Wearing decay like diadems" includes personification and a simile, as the author is comparing the flower's decay to jewelry using "like".
ReplyDeleteI read “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop. This poem has a lot of enjambment in it. I think that this device may have been included to make readers more likely to continue once they’ve begun since the sentences are incomplete.
ReplyDeleteI read “Tulips” by A. E. Stallings. There were many examples of personification, one of them that really stood out to me was “And do not wilt as much as faint”. This could be personification because tulips were said to be fainting which isn’t possible for a flower to faint, only humans faint.
ReplyDeleteI read a Blurry Photograph by Martha Ronk and I noticed that it’s a free verse poem which adds to the feeling of it being light and free, and makes it seem more appropriate for the subject.
ReplyDeleteI read "Wild Geese" By mary oliver Which is full of lots of graphic imagery woven together. I particularly liked the line "the sun and the clear pebbles of the rain". I never really thought of rain as pebbles, but it is a cool thing to think about and this description paints a clear image in my mind.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop. There was many places where she use similes but one that stuck out to me was “Here and there his brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper” she used this because the fish skin looks like old wallpaper -Angelica
ReplyDeleteI read “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop and I found imagery in these lines “the big bones and the little bones,the dramatic reds and blacks of his shiny entrails, and the pink swim-bladderlike a big peony.”
ReplyDeleteI read "The Fish" by Elizabeth Bishop and found visual imagery and similes in the lines: "his brown skin hung in strips / like ancient wallpaper, / and its pattern of darker brown / was like wallpaper: / shapes like full-blown roses / stained and lost through age." This invokes a sense of interest and wonder over the fish that she will later admire and let go because of it.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishops and noticed a line that was both visual imagery and a simile. It said “his brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper”, comparing the fishes skin to ancient wallpaper, maybe suggesting that the fish is looks old and rough.
ReplyDeleteI read “Tulips” by A. E. Stallings. I noticed an oxymoron with a simile in the line “parading finishes like starts.” It makes me think about how similar starts and finishes can be.
ReplyDeleteI read "Brokeheart: Just like That" by Patrick Rosal. He uses onomatopoeia in lines such as "Sometimes sadness is just what comes between the dancing. And bam!, my mother’s dead and, bam!, my brother’s children are laughing. Just like—ok, it’s true I can’t pop up from my knees so quick these days " to show how his feelings of sadness wound him, using sounds to signify hits, portraying an emotional wound as a physical one.
ReplyDeleteI read "There's A Hole In My Sidewalk" by Portia Nelson. I noticed a metaphor that is extended throughout the poem: the narrator tells a story about walking down an unfamiliar street and falling into a hole in the ground, taking a long time and much effort to find his/her way out. Of course, it's not the his/her fault, because it's a new street to him/her. However, the narrator then chooses to walk down the same street a second time, pretending not to see the hole in the ground. When he/she falls in again, the person convinces himself/herself that it's not his/her fault. This represents a denial that can be associated with addiction or other problematic behavior. The narrator then decides to take the same path a third time, still ending up in the hole "out of habit". This represents an unhealthy pattern of becoming accustomed to having a problem, instead of trying to find a solution, until the problem becomes a habit. But after falling into the hole this time, the narrator realizes that it is his/her fault. Acknowledging the problem means having a growing awareness of what's wrong. Only then can a person change the trouble-causing behavior. The narrator walks down the same street a fourth time, but avoids the hole. This represents the beginning of problem-solving---for example, the start of recovery in an addiction. The next time, the narrator decides to take a different street altogether. This is a positive decision, showing the person's will to change in order to prevent the problem from occurring again. The metaphor gives the poem meaning, and allows people to connect with the message. Without it, the poem is just about a hole in the street, and isn't very relatable to readers.
ReplyDelete-Anya C.
I love "Autobiography in Five Short Chapters"! Thanks for unpacking the extended metaphor.
DeleteI read [love is more thicker than forget] BY E. E. CUMMINGS. It is an Apostrophe. It is a passage, addressed to the reader, about love and what love is like. It also uses personification, calling love mad, sane, and other things
ReplyDeleteI read a blurry photograph which describes the surroundings which I noticed a lot of visual and tactile imagery
ReplyDeleteI read "To be of use" by Marge Piercy which uses a simile when saying "The work of the world is common as mud."
ReplyDeleteI read “Musee des Beaux Arts” by W.H. Auden. The poetic devices that were used in this poem was metaphor and free verse.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Enkindled Spring” by D.H. Lawrence, and I found that when he was describing spring itself, he chose to diplay spring in movement as the seasons transitioned, “And I, what fountain of fire am I among. This leaping combustion of spring.” Here, personification was used to give movement to ‘spring’ itself by using the words leaping combustion.
ReplyDeleteI read "I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud" by William Wordsworth. This poem has a ABABCC rhyme scheme and had many examples of imagery and personification. One example of personification was, "The waves beside them danced". Another device the poem uses is enjambment.
ReplyDeleteI read “a blurry photograph” used a lot of tactile, visual, simile and personification.
ReplyDeleteI read “You Fit into Me” by Margret Atwood. The poetic devices used in it are imagery and simile
ReplyDeleteI read "In Cold Spring Air" by Reginald Gibbons, which is a poem almost entirely built around enjambment, the only punctuation in the entire poem is hyphens, and they break up a single long sentence about "blindfolds we keep thinking we are seeing through". The enjambment in the arrangement of the poem in this case seems to be the poem, the poem in word count is very brief, but is spread across 14 lines with alternating indents, the poem creates the blindfolds it is talking about with it's enjambment.
ReplyDeleteI read ‘Turtle Came to See Me’ by Margarita Engle. The lines “of a dancing tree,/the branches
ReplyDeletetossed by island wind.” demonstrate imagery, rather it be auditory with the sounds of the wind or visual as you can imagine the island trees. Also, another line, “In my California kindergarten class, the teacher scolds me: REAL TREES/DON'T LOOK LIKE THAT.” stuck out to me because even though I don’t know what the device is called for this, putting the words in all caps demonstrates how the teacher is talking - loudly, that is, and how the speaker felt when she “yells” that at her.
I read “Beginning” and there was personification when it said “the crying of the birds”
ReplyDeleteI read “The Road Not Taken” by Robert Frost where there was a deep metaphor to life throughout the entire poem. I also noticed personification when the poem reads, “Because it was grassy and wanted wear” as well as imagery and simile throughout.
ReplyDeleteI read “The Idea of Order at Key West” by Wallace Stevens and in it was an example of personification. “ The grinding water and the gasping wind” which I think was used to show how a simple song controlled the sea.
ReplyDeleteI read "The Sun Rising" by John Donne. This poem uses metaphor, I think to both add additional layers of meaning to the poem, make it sound better, and also to connect it to life.
ReplyDeleteI read “A blurry photograph” by Martha Ronk. She used personification when describing the objects in the said photograph, such as “ the outline of a branch folds back into itself”.
ReplyDeleteI read a poem called "Don't Quit" by John Greenleaf Whittier. It used Couplet: "two lines of verse, usually in the same meter and joined by rhyme, forming a unit." Here is an except: "Success is failure turned inside out—/The silver tint of the clouds of doubt"
ReplyDeleteI read "The Voice" by Shel Silverstein. The poem uses a lot of rhyming to make the points stated more bold and stand out better. It ties the whole poem together. Examples include "long... wrong" and "decide... inside".
ReplyDeleteI read Earl Reum’s “ A person, A paper, A promise”. This is one of my favorite poems. The structure of the poem splits it up into 4 different parts. Each representing different stages of his life and the realization of childhood lies he once believed. His loss of innocence.
ReplyDeleteI read “ For a Friend in Maryland” by Gerard Hopkins. Garda Hopkins uses visual imagery to describe the land during spring.
ReplyDelete