Blog 11, option one

A poem's form has a most literal way of guiding a poem's flow/ rhythm. There can be fast parts, slow parts, parts associated with a feeling that can be dying or rising, and parts can be emphasized or subdued in importance.

E.E. Cummings's “Buffalo Bill's Defunct” is a respectful ode to Buffalo Bill, and is remorseful of his passing. The second line is one word: “defunct”. The word “defunct” means “no longer operating or in use,” which gives Buffalo Bill a mechanical, machine-like element. This somewhat satirizes people's understanding of Buffao Bill as someone “who used to ride a watersmooth-silver stallion, [and so-on].” The word defunct procures its following description of Bill as the three facts that are presented about him in this poem; the things that everybody knew about him, and are no longer true. “Watersmooth-silver stallion” is given two lines to give the word stallion its own pedestal, enhancing its importance. The next line simply skips the spaces between the words to speed it up. Then the interjection is set off by its own line, and not indented quite as far as the last letters of the preceding line, mimicking how Bill's stunt would be reacted to in real time. The rest of the poem alternates between super-indented lines and lines that start at the edge margin. Only the names are capitalized. The time it takes us to get to the next word is normally periodic, like the lyrics of a song. Between each line there is a pause, usually of the same length. Buffalo Bill's Defunct has so many variations on this normal structure that all we can use to judge the beat and timing of the poem is the spacing.

The form in George Herbert's “Easter Wings” is much more shapely and has a pattern that is easy to follow. The progression of line length from large to small reflects the slope of deterioration that both such segments describe. The other sections of the poem give a rising sensation. The poem's text looks like a bird, or if viewed from the side, could be flames, storm clouds, even Devil horns. Or Sauron's helmet. A much more nerdy interpretation would be a sinusoidal graph, which would poetically support the same trend as the lengthening and shortening of the lines, even though science would provide us with no further understanding. “The flight in me” could represent the action the speaker is threatening to take, which I think might either be suicide or a strong indication of hope for future ability to achieve the “wealth and store” the Lord created in man in the beginning. It seems as though he is trying to point out the unfairness of the suffering he must endure because of Adam and Eve, stating that “my tender age in sorrow did I begin,” and that Adam and Eve had a chance to see what the “wealth and store” was like, but he didn't, and he wants to pursue it. The speaker points out how “affliction” will sill be his main motivation.

blog 10

Option 1:

First, to translate the first 8 lines: John Keats first claims his interest and experience in works of art and literature. He describes his credentials as a critic of the Odyssey, by referencing Apollo, the Greek god of Poetry. The next lines could translate, “I have heard a lot about Homer's 'The Odyssey,' but my mind was blown when I heard Chapman speak it.”

We can concur that Keats knows a good work when he sees it. His two epic similes have a surprising, adventurous feel to them. The first demonstrates his pleasant surprise, as though an unexpected gift had showed up at his doorstep. This first simile empathizes with science, which even further expands his credentials. He then compares his experience with what Cortez (really Vasco de Balboa) may have felt just after seeing the Pacific Ocean for the first time. This simile could empathize with historians, hikers, scientists, you name it.

I like to compare it to music. Like when you are listening to a song that you had heard many times before, but never understood the meaning until you were lucky enough not only to be paying attention to the lyrics line by line, but to put them together as a whole and see connections that weren't obvious to you. (this has happened to me before)

I believe Keats shows his roundness by empathizing with different kinds of people with different interests. This reaching out to a higher demographic allows more people to be touched by this poem. Both a planet and an ocean can be seen as whole, or examined for further detail, which scientists and artists alike would most likely do without hesitation. It is apparent to me that Keats intends to go far beyond reading Chapman's translation of the Odyssey, as he is an adventurer of his own type.

I'm not sure what made me like Sylvia Plath's “Metaphors” so much. It's hard to explain. I noticed that there are nine syllables in each line, and there are also nine lines(I'm not sure if this means anything). The first line could indicate that the following lines could be metaphors themselves. The two words “I am”(or I'm) are what give metaphors their identity. So it could be said that every line in this poem is a metaphor. Anything that can be put into print on paper could be the target of a metaphor. Or, if this poem is a riddle, as mentioned in the first line, the answer could be put into a metaphor for the poem: “I am every line of this poem!” It even has nine syllables!  The first line could be a metaphor for the riddle itself. ... “Metaphor metaphor metaphor.”

BLog 8, Dickinson and Hardy

At first, I found Emily Dickinson's poem “Because I could not stop for Death” to be frustrating. I had to read it several times on several different days, on each of which I had to be running a slightly different mood and level of brain performance. It was for the same issue that I was initially drawn to “The Man He Killed” by Thomas Hardy. To me, his poem was simple, and I understood it easily, and it didn't take this stressful coordination of my thoughts and evisceration of my leisure schedule to understand.

Venting done, moving on.

The speaker's tone was a big point of contention for me. I liked how Hardy accomplished a sort of accent, which I perceived to be Scottish or Irish, as this helps to give the poem somewhat of a whimsical mood. He speculates upon his foe as a man largely just like him, who “thought he'd 'list, perhaps off-hand-like, – just as I – ”(lines 13-14). This, I see, as the speaker's acknowledgment of the value of human life, which my prejudgment led me to doubt in Dickinson's poem. Whereas the speaker in Dickinson's poem seems constantly drawn to Death, Hardy shows his preference by sandwiching his description of what happened between two stanzas that emphasize an obviously preferable alternative to war. His fleetingness, given away by, “Yes; quaint and curious war is!”(line 17), he actively tames, using two examples of how these two men would be at the ready to help each other and be friends, had their countries not been at war.

Both poems had to do with life and/or death, which, for some reason, I liked.

I understand that Dickinson was suicidal, and at first, I judged her concept of human life as undeveloped beyond where her feelings of worthlessness had been keeping her, which there is no real evidence of.  Her romanticized depiction, “The carriage held but just ourselves and immortality”(line 4), made it seem like Death was her ticket to heaven/hell/the afterlife/whatever your preference. Before, this seemed irresponsible to me.

I guess my issue could have been to do with the stereotypical distinctions between men and woman. In the tone and structure of Hardy's poem, he shows great integrity of conscience, a trait I admire. Dickinson shows Death the normally girly trait of wanting to maintain decency in polite company. Initially, this angered me, but only after I mistakenly drew into account an imaginary presence of danger to the people around her, which she made no mention of. I came to that conclusion because of the way she paints Death as a concrete character, even capitalizing his name. I pictured Death as a serial killer, for whom the speaker was consciously allowing herself to be seduced. Upon further contemplation (some of which I have documented) on Dickinson's mental state, and ultimately recognizing her possible friendship with Death as a development I do not totally understand, on top of the fact that there is no evidence to support this in the poem whatsoever, I found the strength to let it go.

Now, for a (hopefully) final observation of my feelings regarding these works. Though I did initially not like Dickinson's poem, it presented a depiction of death that I have never thought about before. The last stanza gives a hint that the preceding girth of the poem was a description of something that happened to the speaker, maybe to her house. A near-death situation. Or this is the event that caused her to think about suicide for the very first time. I realized that over the amount of time, “Centuries”(line 21), probably her friendly depiction of Death became the best option for her, since confrontation is so hard to maintain for many women, and since the time frame is so long, the speaker may just as well be seen as an abstract, perhaps immortal, being. “Stopping for Death” was a phrase that I struggled with for a while, whilst writing this response. Now, I think it may mean that the speaker is telling of a time when she was caught up in living with the same perspective, doing the same things (her “labor and leisure”(lines 6-7)), and maybe the experience with the house being destroyed eventually led her to befriend the idea of dying, since they were so close at one point.