A poet can experience various emotions that can be both negative and positive through an encounter with a place. This is evident in poems “Harbour Dusk” by Robert Gray and “William Street” by Kenneth Slessor. Gray creates a negative atmosphere to his poem “Harbour Dusk” however the poem does not completely revolve around negative connotations as such. At times in the poem ‘Harbour Dusk’, the poet portrays a isolated and tranquil surrounding though the atmosphere delivers a sense of melancholy. On the other hand, Slessor’s poem “William Street” challenges the readers by attributing beauty to the urban setting of the city streets.
The selection of the verb ‘feel’ highlights the sense of loss; in this context the idea of feeling is essentially intangible and serves to emphasis the loneliness and perhaps, haunting effect, felt by the author. The verb ‘sleeping’ makes the idea of death seem natural, thus that the death was too due to natural causes and perhaps expected. The use of enjambment emphasises the idea of time passing. But it also provides a sense of haunting as the author feels
Both The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls and A Psalm of Life share similar philosophies: Death is a part of life. However they differ in the moods of the writing; The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls portrays the philosophy in a dark and pessimistic mood while A Psalm of Life is more optimistic and sanguine. Both poems share the philosophy that death is a part of life. Longfellow states that life is a cycle. He says this in A Psalm of Life: “…the grave is not its goal."
While he is not seen as a saint within the poem (he remarks in a sarcastic matter to Plath in the poem), he positions the reader to empathise with him, painting the image that he is the placid one in the relationship, and the one who encourages her to embark on her creative pursuits “Get that shoulder under your stanzas/ And we’ll be away.”. The repeated use of the pronoun “your” creates an accusatory tone, suggesting that they were living Plath’s life, rather than their life. The poem also hints that Plath’s father was a monster. He describes her father as a goblin that influenced and controlled the mind of Plath’s. He even goes one step further
The poem is written as a turning point for the poet, his introspection gives him strength to make the decision that will change his life. The drive is a dramatic thing for him as it has taken him to new, positive places with positive directions. The drive in the country has become a world of liberty which allows him to refuse a way of life that is demanding and full of activity, “that runs only one way”. The poet has effectively implied natural images of peaceful tranquility. The setting has a reflective tone in which the poet is spellbound by the scene in stanza one, “I stood by the water’s edge and watched how swallows swam through the air”.
How has T. S. Eliot utilised specific elements of his form to engage varying audiences intellectually and emotionally? T.S. Eliot’s ‘Preludes’ and ‘The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock’ explore the self-consciousness caused by the intense pessimism of a toxic urban world, which leads to passivity and a lack of agency. Eliot uses varying elements of the form of poetry to present the major concepts of his modernist context, the conflict between the individual and society, disempowerment and time and the ritualistic nature of life, which also allow him to intellectually and emotionally engage a present day audience. Eliot portrays life as tarnished through urban decay, which is typical of the modernist era.
However Abse in ‘Leaving Cardiff ‘has his character talk in first person “ I wait in the evening airâ€. I believe that this technique is more effective as the poem is more heartfelt if the person in the poem is talking in first person as they are directly lonely making the reader get emotional entwined with the poem. In Larkin’s ‘talking in bed’ Larkin talks about how the most fulfilling time of the couples lives how they are awkward, isolated and lonely next to each other and they shouldn’t be. Larkin uses a pun to make the reader think and understand the content and his own thoughts on the subject “Lying togetherâ€. This is to the fact that the couple is lying next to each other, but also directed at what could be little conversation where
This adds a sense of surrealism to the poem as wells as being Transtromer’s method of commenting on the abstract nature of the human condition and showing that true intimacy transcends the physical level. He further describes human intimacy by extending the simile of the meeting of ‘two colours’ by stating that they meet ‘on the wet paper of a school school’s painting’. This is used by Transtromer to show the chaotic and sloppy nature of intimacy in relation to the human condition. The third stanza of the poem explores the judgmental nature of society towards privacy and intimacy in relation to the human condition. Transtromer description of town as ‘pulled closer tonight.
By interspersing ballad poems throughout the text yet leaving them unaddressed by the characters, Munro creates silences between the reader and the world in her story. Since the poems give clues to Heather Bell’s disappearance, the silence created forces the reader to delve into what is not written in order to makes sense of the story. The intertextuality is also jarring to the reader as the poems interwoven throughout use a whimsical rhyme scheme and light-hearted tone, all while dealing with an ominous and dark subject. This ironic juxtaposition causes the verse to be accentuated, emphasizing the deconstruction of a linear narrative. This demonstrates Munro’s ability to use interspersed styles to comment upon content through form.
Larkin proposes his melancholy perception of life’s own fate in a mocking tone to reflect the reality of what life ultimately ends with death. Despite speaking with pleasantness and optimism during the first stanza toward “days,” Larkin thwarts the whole conception of a wonderful life when he answers “what are days for?” in the second stanza. His lack of empathy and dry nature mocks the naivety of society’s perception of a happy life. Society fixates on the idea that one will continue living a sustainable life from the moment they are successful but Larkin argues that this is not true. To further his notion of society’s forged insight, Larkin touches upon the bright side of life by stating that days are “to be happy in” and should not be taken for granted because a person is not guaranteed to continue living contentedly and substantially.