In Wild Oats It explains that a person, over the course of time, comes to realise that his greatest desires of love, are unattainable, and second best things will have to suffice. The central purpose of this poem is to show that love is one of these great desires and despite flashes of promise it contains scarcely anything that is more than fragmentary. Larkin reveals this through tone and diction. Both poets seem to focus a lot on the physical side of love where lust and desire are involved however Abse makes it sound more sensual and even spiritual when he speaks of Eros in his poem. Larkin portrays this sense of objectification in his poem with regards to woman as he describes a woman as a ‘bosomy English rose’ and then follows on to call her ‘beautiful’ throughout the poem portraying the sexual lust involved with love.
Each poem I have chosen reflects aspects of contemplation, sadness or regret. Robert Frost's "The Road Not Taken" examines feelings of regret and choices in time, Sir Walter Raleigh's "Life" is a poem of contemplation; of existence and time before its end. Finally, John Milton's "Of Time", a typically dramatic piece by the 16th century master of 'epic' poetry. "Of Time" is written of the bittersweet relationship between mortal lives and the aching shortness of said lives. The chosen image of an hourglass is a typical, although, undeniably apt choice of symbolism wherever time is involved.
A typical Romantic poem often starts with a description of nature, and then slowly moves on to a human emotional problem which is a result of the observation of nature. Another kind of Romantic nature-poem personifies nature, so that it ends up expressing human life and passions. The Romantic poet saw himself as “a genius” and placed himself outside society and the rest of humanity. The poet was able to look under the surface of everyday things into what they called the essence. The poem I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud deals with the speaker’s state of mind.
Sonnet 116 is a Shakespearian sonnet where as sonnet 43 is a patrachiah sonnet. Both the different types of sonnet helps to present romantic love in different ways. They both have only one stanza, this could be to say that there love has no brakes or holes. The poems are similar but they both use different language features such as repetition “remover to remove” this could suggest that love is consistent. Both poems generally give a positive overview of love; both poets suggest that love is never ending and can battle through bad situations.
The first symbol gets its start in line five when Shakespeare says, “Oh no! it is an ever-fixed mark." Speaking about the love between two people, he starts to balance the persevering concept of love to a star, most likely the North Star, whose position is “ever-fixed” in the sky. Love is used for navigation. Shakespeare uses the star as a symbol for how love is constant and strong.
Compare the methods that poets use to create an interesting character in “Singh Song!” and another poem from character and voice (“Checking out Me History”). Both poems are dramatic monologues and have a conversational tone. The poems are written in free verse and this has connotations to the way that the characters have confusion over their identity. The irregular stanza lengths show the various cultural differences between the poems. In the poem “Singh Song!”, the poet uses repetition to show the persona of Singh as being very personal and intimate when he spends the little time that he has with his “newly bride”.
In order to emphasise Larkin’s outlooks onto time and it’s passing, one can highlight the similarities and differences between Larkin and Abse’s poetry. In ‘Love Songs In Age’, Larkin illustrates the view that time and it’s passing merely leads to many disappointments. The enjambment he uses amongst all three stanzas, “and stood/relearning” in the first and second and “more/the glare” between the second and third; this implies the suggestion that love cannot stop the passing of time and the instances that happen within it, for example the death of the woman’s husband. During the first stanza, Larkin uses imagery to create a memoir of the music sheets that the woman has found, “one marked in circles”, “and coloured”, suggesting that the joy of life, love and happiness isn’t appreciated until age shows what one has missed during their youth. We can then imply from this suggestion that Larkin feels time is only appreciated during the older years of one’s life.
‘Sonnet 29’ and ‘First Love’ both meditate upon love, however ‘Sonnet 29’ chooses to reflect on the transience of love and how it leaves you vulnerable, whereas ‘First Love’ cogitates about how love is uncontrollable and everlasting. Both poems are quite pensive but share completely different views. ‘Sonnet 29’ starts with the anaphora of “Pity me not…”. This makes it seem as if the poet, Edna St Vincent Millay, is being defensive as she becomes frustrated and reveals her annoyance, hinting that she may be feeling vulnerable and feeling insecure which links back to the poems theme of love leaving you alone and uncertain. This notion is reflected upon in ‘First Love’, where John Clare uses the oxymoron, “silent voice”.
English Poetry Essay Choose a poem which appealed to you because it was striking – show which techniques the poet has used to capture your interest and engage your feelings “To His Coy Mistress” is a piece of metaphysical poetry written by Andrew Marvell. This poem, like most metaphysical poetry, makes use of original images and has a very profound meaning behind it. “To His Coy Mistress” is particularly striking because of the deeper themes that it deals with, such as mortality and the idea of “carpe diem”, as well as the unique imagery used throughout and the interesting structure and progression of the poem. The use of the image “vegetable love” is very effective in capturing the reader’s interest. “Vegetable” is not usually the
Being gullible and immature, Dorian’s efforts to follow Lord Henry’s teaching causes Dorian to lose his way, and his soul. With these characters, Wilde’s novel explores the ideas of art, beauty, and pleasure, but the main theme is of their consequences. In particular, there are two passages that exemplify this theme, indicate the plot of the novel, and strike the reader. The first important passage is the when Gray strikes the Faustian bargain for his soul. Basil is finishing his painting of Dorian while Dorian and Lord Henry are in the garden.