Category: Poetry

Walt Whitman’s “Spontaneous Me” (Norton 2151-2152) crystallizes his attempt to create poems that appear natural, impulsive and untamed. The natural effect is a carefully crafted technique that appears throughout his writing, hinting at a philosophy of life while seeming to simply offer observation. As in “Song of Myself,” Whitman weaves together carefully chosen images to…

Through his work in poetry, literature, and other media, Walt Whitman is often considered one of the most significant American writers and theorists. He arguably popularized all-American literature with his work, injecting American writing into an era where only genteel and European-traditionist literature was taught in college. As evident by his epic from Leaves of…

The act of revisiting the past is akin to responding to the texts that exist there in a particular culture. Since this culture is ever evolving, so is the understanding of the text. The socio-cultural changes that are brought with time lead one to look at old texts again for often there is a possibility…

Charles Altieri writes that in his collection of poetry, Turtle Island, Gary Snyder encapsulates two roles: the seer and the prophet. Altieri describes the two roles vaguely, the seer being one who is able to look past the irrelevant aspects of modern life to a purer kind of experience, while the prophet is able to…

Linda Pastan’s To a Daughter Leaving home and Margaret Atwood’s Death of a Young Son by Drowning both apply imagery and symbolism to exemplify the difficulties of being a parent. These poems describe the moments and instances that no parent wants to consider. They confirm that parenting can be the hardest job in the world.…

Linda Pastan’s 1988 poem, “To a Daughter Leaving Home”, concerns the idea of children growing up and leaving, whether it be for college or simply riding a bike for the first time. The speaker of the poem starts out with a nostalgic feel, addressing the child and reminiscing on a time the child was eight…

Sometimes a stranger offers to help, sometimes a person is forced to ask a stranger, but when the car won’t start, odds are two strangers are going to meet. Linda Pastan’s 1984 poem, “Jump Cabling,” reveals how the simple act of jump-starting a car may jump-start love. Through repetition, alliteration, simile, metaphor, and a unique…

Wallace Stevens is known for his philosophical meditations on the dual nature of existence throughout his poetry. According to Stevens, poetry should not be concerned with either the body or the mind, but rather “an interdependence of the imagination and reality as equals.” It is rather difficult to interlock the two concepts as they stand…

An event marked by sex and celebration, the wake in Wallace Stevens’s “The Emperor of Ice-Cream” is inescapably bizarre. Though one might expect an air of sobriety, importance, or – at the very least – reflection to characterize a discussion of death, the poem’s language and content are instead suffused with an almost nonsensical air…

Race played a huge role in determining a relationship with the police in London after the mass migration of non-caucasian individuals. The poem ‘Sonny’s Lettah’ by Linton Kwesi Johnson provides a clear representation of how the black race was treated on the streets, and their relationship with authoritative figures. The poem also portrays the relationships…