Poetic Excellence: A Personal Reflection

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Raising thought-provoking questions, issues, and ideas, poetry builds bridges that allow man to transverse great expanses of controversy and debate. The poet, a master of words, shares his visions and perspectives through these pieces of literature; giving life to the poem. I believe good poetry is a form of expression that celebrates revolutionary ideas which provide a broader frame of reference to its readers. The English poet, John Keats, reaffirms this opinion stating, “poetry should be great and unobtrusive, a thing which enters into one's soul, and does not startle it or amaze it with itself, but with its subject” (Poetry Quotes). Depending on the traditional values and principles of the time, poetry should be progressive, allowing for newer ideals and a newer generation. In accordance with these criteria, Wilfred Owen’s Dulce et Decorum Est, Wallace Stevens’ Anecdote of the Jar, and William Edward Burghardt Du Bois’ The Song of the Smoke all demonstrate unique, thought provoking perspectives on issues controversial to their respective eras of creation. To begin with, Wilfred Owen, a British soldier of the First World War, had written Dulce et Decorum Est as an attempt to express his opinion about the war; a view that contradicted with the generally accepted perspective of it. The poem is rather sarcastic, describing war with dark humour and detail. This humour is present even in the title Dulce et Decorum Est; a popular expression in the First World War. It is half of a Latin saying taken from Odes by Roman poet Horace meaning “It is sweet and right” with the full phrase, Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori, translating to “it is sweet and right to die for your country.” The phrase completes itself in the poem at the end where, after the gas attack, Owen mocks it saying “my friend, you would not tell with such high zest/to children ardent for some
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