Edger Allen Poe's Poetry

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A Walk in the Woods Worth a Thousand Texbooks When someone hears the word poetry, they usually think of Shakespeare or Edger Allen Poe. Who’s poetry usually consists of mind numbing metaphors and words that haven’t been used since King Arthur sat at the round table. Personally the only poetry I read, is on Valentine’s day and get well soon cards. Usually when I hear the word poetry, my whole body cringes up like a cat in water, and it’s all because my Senior year of high school we were forced to read the play Macbeth, written by Shakespeare . Now besides not being able to understand one single line within the play without having to use spark notes, I couldn’t find any interest or relate to the play at all. Also it’s hard enough being…show more content…
Every line that I read brought in waves of memories from the time I spent on the Appalachian Trail (AT) and backpacking trips out west. He starts the poem with the line, “The plains ignore us but the mountains listen”. Back packing through plains or flat grass lands is unlike anything you'll ever experience. To feel the vast openness of the earth is so incredibly energizing. But it is also extremely terrifying because if you did a complete 360 degree turn, you'd see nothing but maybe a mountain range a few dozen miles out and you feel so vulnerable out there. Where as hiking through the Whites Mountains range of New Hampshire, you were engulfed by mother natures best. Surrounded by wildlife and small streams, but only when you reach the top of the mountain, can you feel how powerful it actually is. “An audience of thousands holding its breath in each rock”. My favorite part of hiking the AT was all the great and interesting people I got to meet and talk with. I hiked with Surgeons, former police officers, homeless people, ex military, nurses, auto mechanics, and even a congress man at one time or another. So just about everyday you are hiking with someone and you go back and forth telling each other stories, life experiences, advice, and I did my best to soak up as much knowledge, as I possible could. That's why the next line in Visiting Mountains brought back the most memories to me, “Climbing, we pick our way over the skulls of small talk”. Although the one thing I can't figure out about this poem is why Kooser says “skulls” of small talk, because skulls usually signify death or lose and the small talk for me was the best part of the whole experience. The next line is “On the prairies below us, the grass leans this way and that in discussion; words fly away like corn shucks over fields”. Now I interpreted this as just an extension of Kooser saying that the mountains listen to what you have to say

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