I commented on brits and ali ls blogs

my comic is on my face book and i commented on jrbs, natiles blog. :]

A poison Tree

This is an AABB rhyme scheme which helps poem flow. It is made of four stanzas which are each quatrains. The firs stanza is in the pattern in which each line starts with I was, or I told alternating.

I was angry with my friend:
I told my wrath, my wrath did end.
I was angry with my foe:
I told it not, my wrath did grow.

And I watered it in fears
Night & morning with my tears;
And I sunned it with smiles,
And with soft deceitful wiles.

And it grew both day and night,
Till it bore an apple bright.
And my foe beheld it shine,
And he knew that it was mine,

And into my garden stole,
When the night had veiled the pole;
In the morning glad I see
My foe outstretched beneath the tree.

This poem is very interesting with the use of personification for the tree. The first stanza takes a look at how human emotions like anger, hate, and wrath grow. I completely related to the line “I told it not, my wrath did grow” it is very hard to control your anger. The second stanza is all about how we try to fool and deceive our anger from growing. The third stanza relates to the biblical story of Adam and Eve. The fruits of the trees labors to hide its anger bore an apple. I can’t decide why Eve a woman would be the trees foe. Women in general are often related to mother earth, or the family tree. The tree and Eve could be the same person and Adam is her foe, the tree/she gives Adam the apple and sees him outstretched beneath the tree. This poem gives another look at a very classic story, using personification from the trees point of view.

What the mirror said

listen,
you a wonder
you a city
of a woman.
you got a geography
of your own.

The narrator seems like a self confident woman, admiring her beauty. To compare herself to a city, I think she was talking about her inner complexity. The geography refers to her power. Though history power has been expressed by how much land you own. Women have more shape and skin on their body then men, the skin can represent power.

listen,
somebody needa map
to understand you.
somebody need directions
to move around you.

She’s saying that she is not an object for men. She is special and deserves someone special. She cannot be taken advantage of.

listen,
woman,
you not a noplace
anonymous
girl;
mister with his hands on you
he got his hands on
on
damn
body!

The woman was sexually assaulted (I assume raped) by a man, but she knows he can only touch her body and not her soul. This is a really powerful message to all the girls out there that no one can ever hurt your soul. This poem is one stanza, the listens, break up the poem helping the story unfold. This poem is often related to Homage to My Hips by Lucille Clifton.


these hips are big hips.
they need space to
move around in.
they don't fit into little
petty places. these hips
are free hips.
they don't like to be held back.
these hips have never been enslaved,
they go where they want to go
they do what they want to do.
these hips are mighty hips.
these hips are magic hips.
i have known them
to put a spell on a man and
spin him like a top

This poem is similar in the fact it also gives power to women. By talking about how women can derive power
from their beauty, and womanly powers. It is the same style and also one stanza.

the lesson of the falling leaves

the leaves believe
such letting go is love
such love is faith
such faith is grace
such grace is god
i agree with the leaves

This poem is very fluid and easy to read. The poem follows each main idea love, faith, and grace from line to line giving the feeling of a leaving falling though the air. The poem is one stanza made of six lines. The poem to me has dual meaning. One is saying good bye to someone who is dead or dying and you are letting go because you love them and have faith that you will see them again. I think that this poem can also be about letting go of your childhood. The leave lets go of its mother the tree and ventures out on its own. Like seeds of plants floating out having faith that they find a home.

Many red devils...

Many red devils ran from my heart
And out upon the page,
They were so tiny
The pen could mash them.
And many struggled in the ink.
It was strange
To write in this red muck
Of things from my heart.

This poem is one stanza that is an octet. I think the poem is literal I couldn’t decide what the devil were. I thought they could be a thought from deep in his soul. To me this poem had an endearing tone towards the little devils. The darkest thing I found in Crane’s life had an encounter with a prostitute. The devils are mashed to make the red ink he has to kill his own inner thoughts to write a thought which I thought was interesting. I don’t want to beat this poem with a hose so I think I’ll stop trying to smash the little devils.

this is a photograph of me

The first three stanzas describe someone looking at a photo of them self. The photo is described in great detail. The photo is of a lake by a small by a lake the photo is all smudged up. But there is no person. Then the next four stanzas are in partheses decribe where they are. I wondered since the photo was smudged because it was very old and she was looking back from heaven.

It was taken some time ago
At first it seems to be
a smeared
print: blurred lines and grey flecks
blended with the paper;

then, as you scan
it, you can see something in the left-hand corner
a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree
(balsam or spruce) emerging
and, to the right, halfway up
what ought to be a gentle
slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,
and beyond that, some low hills.


When I found out this photo is from the day after they drowned in the lake, I wondered if someone took the photo unknowingly or if it was a police photo. I thought the ()made the last stanzas more intimate like if someone were whispering to me like it was a silly little secret they photo bomed someone’s pretty lake picture. “It is difficult to say where precisely, or to say how large or how small I am: the effect of water on light is a distortion. But if you look long enough eventually you will see me” This made me think of heaven. You can see the angles and loved one but if you’re long enough you can. I thought this could also mean we lose our self’s in life or sadness and can barley find ourselves again.

(The photograph was taken
the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the center
of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say where
precisely, or to say
how large or how small I am:
the effect of water
on light is a distortion.

but if you look long enough
eventually
you will see me.)

Nothing Gold Can Stay

Nature's first green is gold
Her hardest hue to hold.
Her early leaf's a flower;
But only so an hour.
Then leaf subsides to leaf.
So Eden sank to grief,
So dawn goes down to day.
Nothing gold can stay.


This poem is one stanza that is an octave. This poem is end stopped and is one thought that flows through the whole poem. This poem is packed full of paradox like “Nature's first green is gold” and “Her early leaf's a flower”. This poem can be looked at as a spring poem. But I think this poem is about mortality of man. When we were first created we were free of sin (with hearts of gold) in the green garden of Eden. Not sinning is very heard no matter how hard we try every one sins at one point. Adam had the weight of the world on his shoulders to not sin ever that is a very hard hue to hold. “Her early leaf's a flower; But only so an hour.” He was free of sin but could only last for so long like the flower bloom of an apple. Then he went to the nature of man turning his bloom of not sinning in to leaf. Adam ate the apple and doomed humanity to grief. The dawn of man sank and we were cast away from the Lords good graces in Eden. Nothing so pure can stay.

Not Waving but Drowning

“Nobody heard him, the dead man,
But still he lay moaning:
I was much further out than you thought
And not waving but drowning.”

The first stanza which is a quatrain describes a man dying. “I was much further out than you thought” No one can feel or gauge how depressed someone truly feels. Nobody can hear the man’s moaning, because it is in the center of his soul. Waving is a happy action that welcomes and shares joy. While drowning is the same motion but filled with panic and desperation. While the man may look like he’s happy and waving but he is drowning and splashing.

“Poor chap, he always loved larking
And now he's dead
It must have been too cold for him his heart gave way,
They said.”

The second stanza is also a quatrain. Larking is having harmless fun and pulling pranks. When people commit suicide we always deny it clamming they were so happy and larking that suicide can’t be an option. We think they must have made an accident maybe the cold froze their heart.

“Oh, no, no, no, it was too cold always
(Still the dead one lay moaning)
I was much too far out all my life
And not waving but drowning.”

The last stanza is also a quatrain. In this stanza the possibility of suicide is excepted because it was always cold. She realizes she was too far out to see his depression and waved back at him while he was drowning.

NEW POEM PACKET

Introduction to Poetry

This poem is made up of 7 stanzas one single line, three couplets, and five terces. The imagery that Collins uses is easy to recall because each sense is used. This poem has a more structured feel to it and reads well.

Hallways

Goodbye to all the crowed hallways
I always had to push through,
Full of people in hats
That always got snatched away,
The wet winter floors that were like a slip in slide,
The low mumbles of teenage angst

Hello open campus,
I don’t have to squeeze through
Full of new faces
With talk of radical new ideas,
Goodbye small purple hall, Hello to my new life.

Much madness is divinest sense

This poem is one stanza, and has no set rhyme. Each line is capitalized even if it is not the start of a new sentence. This poem repeats the word sense often and uses words starting in s to give the poem a better flow. This poems message was questing what madness is, are the ones we consider mad truly genius. I liked the message because it made me think.

It was a dream

I really liked this poem due to its rich visual images. This poem was in stopped but reads very fluid. I thought it was very interesting there were no capitals except This at the very end. By only capitalizing This it emphasized the message even more. The poem is also one stanza long but look like two stanzas because, “what,” breaks up the poem and transitions focus. This poem had no set rhyme.

the cat

This poem has 6 stanzas one couplet one quatrain two quintain and two sestet. The way the lines are cut off makes the poem read more aggressive. Each stanza besides the couplet is one sentence. “Outside it was night like a book without letters.” I like the book metaphor a book without letter would be white but still reminds us of night. “I said to her do not go why want nothing?” I think this can mean Nirvana to want nothing but can also man to want material need which really amount to nothing. Wanting material objects or searching for salvation can lead to losing our self’s. “No one ever saw her again. Not even she herself.” I loved that line of the poem.

alone

This poem is made of one stanza. This poem has an AABBAABB scheme. The rhyming and usage of punctuation made the poem flow very well making it easy to read out loud. The poem also used the same words for (example from, my, as, and, the) to start each line of the poem which made the poem flow more. “From childhood’s hour I have not been as others were – I have not seen as others saw…” The narrator is different than other people he is very strange. “I could not bring my passions from a common spring” I found this very interesting because springs or water wells have historically been a symbol of community. The narrator feels excluded from his water well which excludes all his passion from normal society. “All I lov’d- I lov’d alone” I thought of all those shows on TLC about obsessions. You might love to eat cotton swabs but you love to eat them alone. “And the clouds that took the form (when the rest of the heavens were blue) a demon was in my view-“I thought this was so interesting if you take it literally or symbolically.
*The picture is named Alone and the painter was inspired by this poem.

Sort of Song

Song of sort uses a metaphor to make the poet a snake. The snake waits in the weeds, like a poet brain storming, when the snake strikes the poet is has a moment of inspiration. “No ideas but in things” like the snake all ideas come from the tangible world. The poem has no rhyme scheme, and uses very simple words. The poem is made of two quatrains that are Sestets.

ps I posted on Brit B and Julias blogs

The Book

I first read through The Book and found the twist at the end, that this beautiful book the narrator was holding was bound in human skin. I thought this was such an interesting idea because it made me think of fur coats and leather seats and why humans think it is a luxury to wear another dead animal’s skin. The line “I stared and a horror grew, which was, which is, how beautiful it was until I knew.” Really stood out to me, because this is such a universal human experience. We all have relationships or ideas that are beautiful and we out blinded by the fantasy and beauty until we see the horror underneath. Whenever I eat meat I think of it as a tasty meal and not some cute creature running around and than murdered for my supper. Humans have a tendency to just focus on the beauty and ignore the ugly. I thought this poem was pretty straight forward with the message. I also noticed that skin was mentioned a multiple of times and was heavily focused on.

I looked up human skin bound book out of curiosity and found this http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2006/04/0411_060411_skin_book.html although I don’t think this is what the poem is referred to I still think it is morbidly interesting.

Praise in Summer

This poem isn’t really about plants and moles but it is not to cryptic either. The first six lines describe the world upside down. The trees are mines where the branches are roots and the roots are branches. The moles fly and the birds burrow. In line seven Wilbur ask “Why is this mad?” I rember when I was little I would stand on my head and think what if that was right side up and I was upside down? Then as I grew up I learned that was simply madness. Lines 8 to 10 have some more substance. Madness perverts our praise because we are so busy thinking what we are suppose to and we don’t appreciate the true beauty of what is. “Dose sense so stale that it must need derange the world to know it?” He’s asking are we so conformed we need madness to have senses? The last three lines are about how it doesn’t matter if it’s right or wrong we should just appreciate that it is. The rhyme scheme is an ABABA. The strange thing about the poem is that I noticed is that each line starts with a capital letter no matter how the line before ends.

More Pictures of Ammut

Untitled by Stephan Crane

I loved this poem it was short and to the point. The imagery was very unique and strange to me. “In the desert I saw a creature, naked, bestial, who squatted upon the ground,” I was picturing a Salvador Dali painting. “Held his heart in his hands, and ate of it.” This screamed a male version of Ammut, the Devourer to me. The Egyptian goddess lived in the underworld and when men died the gods weighed their heart (believed to hold knowledge and to be the “brain” of our body) against the feather of truth if their heart was heavy with evil and outweighed the feather she viscously devoured their heart. Once Ammut swallowed the heart, the soul was believed to become restless forever. This was called "to die a second time". Ammut was also sometimes said to stand by a lake of fire, where the souls of the hearts she ate suffered. When the creature was asked if he liked the taste he said its bitter and that’s why he liked it. The taste of bitter coffee tattoos on to your taste buds while sweetness fades quickly. Our hearts are also like bitter coffee, we try to cover the bitter taste with sweet sugar but it just fades. “But I like it because it’s bitter, and because it’s my heart.” I would eat my heart even though it’s bitter because without bad experiences that make us bitter we are not human, and I would like my heart because it is the essence of myself.