Because I could not stop for death

Because I could not stop for death by Emily Dickinson is a poem that I very much enjoy to read. The poem was published in 1890, after Emily’s death. This poem also happens to be the one that I am using for the final assignment in the class. The reason that I like the poem so much is because it has so many different aspects that make up the poem. One aspect is that the poem is narrated by a proleptic speaker, an impossible speaker. This is because the narrator is dead; he or she has been carried off by death, “the horses’ heads were towards eternity.” The poem also speaks of existence in that it continues to go on even after death. Life is like the “ring” spoken of in line 10. Life has a beginning, a middle, and an end; life starts with “school,” then moves to work, then comes to an end like the “setting sun.” The kids at the school are playing in the ring or in other words living life on part of this continuation that is being described. The speaker is now seeing this from a point of view different from when he or she was part of the living but even though he or she is not living the narrator is still going on a journey of sorts, still existing in a ring or a circle. This poem also works as a description of what death, more specific burial, might just be like for the dead. “We paused before a house that seemed/ A swelling of the ground;” This pause is suggestive of going to the grave to await further journeys after death. The reason that I enjoy this poem so much is because it explores a subject that nothing is known about. The poem takes a risk. No one knows exactly what it’s like when death comes to ones life To try to explain what that might be like is very difficult and creates great reading. I enjoy reading about others opinions on how this experience might come to pass. 

i carry your heart with me by E.E. Cummings

 I chose to write about E.E. Cummings’ “i carry your heart with me”. Edward Estlin Cummings was born October 14, 1894 and died on September 3, 1962. He was a well-known transcendentalist. Transcendentalists believed in the individual’s experiences with nature, spirits, and emotions. He received his love of writing from his mother when he was a small child, and he wrote the rest of his life.

 “i carry your heart with me” was published in 1923 in E.E. Cummings’ collection of poetry entitled Tulips and Chimneys. The poem tells the story of a very intense love. Words like “heart,” “dear,” “darling,” and “fate” are all used in this poem, and many other words also are used to display the narrator’s affection (1, 3, 4, 6). The narrator begins the poem by telling his love that he carries her heart with him everywhere. By the second stanza, he declares that he needs no world, no fate, no sun or moon because his love contains all those things for him. In the final stanza, he claims that their love is so strong that it prevents the stars from coming together.  Their love is the basis of life. E.E. Cummings uses very descriptive words to portray his lovesick narrator.

“i carry your heart with me” has no rhyme scheme. E.E. Cummings often wrote poems with no set rhyme scheme. Also, another interesting form issue is there are no capitalizations and very, very little punctuation. However, the only punctuation Cummings’ poem does not lack of is parentheses. Many believe that the parentheses emphasize the love that the narrator of the poem tries to display. For example, “i am never without it (anywhere/i go you go, my dear; and whatever is done/by only me is your doing, my darling)” displays the narrator’s desire to portray his love for his lover (2-4). He simply states he is never without her heart, but in the parentheses, he goes on and on about how he goes wherever she goes and does only what she wants. Also, in the final stanza, Cummings includes some personification. He compares growing to a soul hoping and growing to a mind hiding (12, 13). Some readers take the poem as a hyperbole since the narrator exaggerates on his love for his lover so intensely. Many poetic forms are used in “i carry your heart with me”. 

E.E. Cummings wrote a very beautiful love poem. However, some question whether it was meant to be a love poem or a hilarious viewpoint on love. Many question whether anyone would write something portraying a person doting on another in such an exaggerated manner in a serious way. However, one thing is for sure, Cummings wrote an interesting poem that continues to grip people’s attentions even today. 

Written by: Elise Hartzell

11/22/2012

The Journey of a Lifetime with Father Free Verse

Serving as a continuous call to action, Walt Whitman beckons his readers to drop their materialism and obligations for a rugged adventure in "Song of the Open Road". First published in 1855, this poem was apart of Whitman's most noteworthy poetry collection, "Leaves of Grass". Although Whitman spent his entire life adding to and editing "Leaves of Grass", the majority of the published poems explore themes of sexuality, traveling, transcendentalism, and companionship. As I've always idolized the nomadic lifestyle, Whitman's "Song of the Open Road" speaks deeply to me and entices me to embark on a similar adventure.

While at first glance "Song of the Open Road" may not appear as a song or a poem, it adheres to Whitman's characteristic free verse and contains more structure than the majority of his other poems. For example, he begins a large sum of his stanzas with "Allons!", which means "Let's go!" in French. This not only serves a structural purpose, but by repeatedly asking his reader to saddle up and travel with him, Whitman is emphasizing the importance of making a radical change in one's lifestyle. 

Another notion Whitman presses upon the reader throughout “Song of the Open Road” is the attention that must be given to the Soul. He begins a couple of his stanzas with “Here is the efflux of the Soul.” Whitman never personally defines the Soul as being an entity or a thing upon which our livelihood depends. Rather, he leaves his readers to make their own inferences upon what a Soul actually is because he is busy putting forth more effort in connecting the notion of a Soul to the fulfilling happiness that is indicative of the road. This ethereal connection is demonstrated when Whitman says,

“The efflux of the Soul is happiness—here is happiness;

I think it pervades the open air, waiting at all times;
Now it flows unto us—we are rightly charged.“

Although Whitman blatantly asks his readers to literally join him on his spiritual and nomadic journey, one can infer that Whitman is really asking his readers to embark upon a journey of their own. He poetically offers encouragement by detailing the benefits of liberating oneself from the norm. For example, Whitman offers encouragement by addressing fears of the road by saying, “It is safe—I have tried it—my own feet have tried it well.” He offers encouragement by telling readers to abandon obligations by saying, “Let the paper remain on the desk unwritten, and the book on the shelf unopen’d! / Let the tools remain in the workshop! let the money remain unearn’d.” But most strategically of all, Whitman entices the reader to go on a journey by detailing his numerous spiritual revelations and by discussing the endearing qualities of traveling. 

After reading Walt Whitman’s “Song of the Open Road”, anyone with a shed of adventure in them will be immediately tempted to withdraw from the dregs of society and hit the road to have numerous spiritual revelations of their own. Similarly, Whitman’s illustrious descriptions of his travels and revelations evoked a wanderlust within me that no other poet has done before. It is for this reason I love Walt Whitman’s poem, “Song of the Open Road”.

Why I Love "Jabberwocky"

Lewis Carroll’s Jabberwocky, published in 1872 in Through the Looking-Glass: What Alice Found There, is a whimsical poem about an adventurer.  In the poem, nonsense words are used as easily as if they were being substituted for real words.  The poem follows an ABAB rhyme scheme and is in iambic pentameter.  Interestingly, although the poem is full of imaginary words, there are only two stanzas (both of which are the same) wherein Carroll repeatedly uses those imaginary words to rhyme.  There is one occasion of an imaginary word rhyming with a real word, and in that case, the imaginary word ends with a familiar English sound, “snatch.”
 "Beware the Jabberwock, my son
"And hast thou slain the Jabberwock?
   Come to my arms, my beamish boy!
O frabjous day! Callooh! Callay!"
   He chortled in his joy.

   The jaws that bite, the claws that catch!

Beware the Jubjub bird, and shun

   The frumious Bandersnatch!"

In one later verse, Carroll refuses to rhyme two lines:

Carroll introduces in his poem a number of neologisms, such as “chortle,” which has become an acceptable English word.  “Chortle,” in addition to being a neologism, seems to be a blend of two previously-existing English words: “chuckle” and “snort.”  Several of the other nonsense words in “Jabberwocky” seem to also consist of two or three other words, such as “frumious,” which may be a blend of “furious” and “fuming,” and “frabjous,” which may consist of “fabulous,” “joyous,” and “fair.”

The only two stanzas wherein Carroll repeatedly uses his nonsense words to rhyme are the first and last stanzas, which are the same.  This could have a multitude of meanings; the repetition of the stanza may imply a sort of frame narrative; the lack of change may indicate that killing the Jabberwocky was completely meaningless and did nothing to change the grand scheme of things.  It might also simply be a way to begin and end an escapade in imaginary English.

Although Dr. Saussure’s concepts of the signified and the signifier weren’t popularized until after the publication of Through the Looking-Glass and there is little to connect structural linguistics with “Jabberwocky,” it is still interesting to look at the poem as a statement on the disconnect between signified and signifier.  Carroll seems to have had conflicted concepts of what some of his words meant; although he left some notes as to what these words referred to, these notes often contradicted each other.  This leads to some interesting questions about what I would like to call unassigned signifiers, or sounds with no meaning attached.  Do we make meaning for them? Is it arbitrary?

In addition to the questions “Jabberwocky” poses in terms of linguistics and analysis, I love this poem because it’s frickin’ awesome and I like poems that are just plain fun.

Lapping Miles Around Emily Dickinson

"I Like to See it Lap the Miles"
Emily Dickinson : Published 1891

Galloping through my introductory literary study class, a poem that came to my particular attention was Emily Dickinson’s “I Like to See it Lap the Miles.” Like most poets / poems of the class I was unfamiliar with this work as well and the spark to my interest ignited when we did not go over its “meaning” as in depth as we had some of the other works. So, I took it upon myself to look more into the clever four stanza poem and found its “riddle” speaks to me in more ways than one.

To begin, simply, the poem characterizes what seems to be a horse doing horse type things; running around, feeding, drinking, doing some more running, neighing, and finally returning to its stable door. Part of the literary genius of the poem that Dickinson lays out is the glaring ambiguity of what exactly is lapping the miles. At glance it would appear the title using “it” to do the “lapping” would possibly hint that the poem will reveal what is doing all that work, but on the contrary, the poem follows with nothing but that one pronoun. In lines 1, 3, 9, 13, and 17 forms of “it” are explicitly used, adding to the mystery.

Without getting into an entire history of Dickinson, it is commonly recognized that the poem is about trains. Others suggest that the horse is equivalent to the newly installed railway that traveled through Dickinson’s hometown. The poem, not only using the ever evading “it”, utilizes verbage congruent to actions of both a horse and a train. As seen in lines 1, with “lap”, line 3, with “feeds”, and 13, with “neighs like Boanerges” the verbs can be used to describe the actions of both the new train and the familiar horse.

Though seemingly congruent, relating horses to trains, i.e. bringing a common connection to this new thing resulting from the Industrial Revolution, one word in the poem stands out to me. In line 12 Dickinson cleverly throws a cog into the mechanics of the poem by using “stanza.” At first I thought this odd but upon more consideration I found the true beauty of the poem and why it interests me. Given the hint in class that the poem not only says one thing, but says another and that it’s possibly about the poet’s ideal of poems / poetry it dawned on me that anything could replace the word “it” (insert epiphany of the main theme in a project I did on this poem). It was this key moment that helped me realize the true significance of such a work of art. Dickinson constructed an internally functioning poem that can loop for generations where each time her “riddle” is read a new answer can be found. 

A New Fascination in “Ghost House” by Robert Frost

For this week’s poem I’m going with, “Ghost House” by Robert Frost which was published in 1915. Upon stumbling on this poem I immediately became fascinated by the melancholy sentiment that Frost evokes with imagery. Frost’s poetry normally claims his convictions through imagery with positive nature rather than the sad nature found in “Ghost House”. Frost describes this empty house that has been vacant for many “summer ago” and it’s a house that has no light, only darkness. He then elaborates on the condition of the house throughout his stanzas, were imagery of emptiness is expressed of the house. Although this poem evokes a shadow of sadness it produces diction of emptiness through the word choices of “lonely house” and “left no trace”. These word choices are essentially the first attention grabbing words that led me to be completely enthralled with this poem. These word choices illustrate the conviction of something as beautiful as a house can be empty without any one to appreciate the true value it possess.

Reading aloud, the claim I noticed suggests that a person’s mind sight would be more traditional and evidently leads to the end of any new idea to come to mind. For instance, with the word choice of “A cellar in which the daylight falls” suggest that in this “house” the only thing that happens with “daylight” dies. This expression elaborates that people may not allow any new ways of think enter your old brain.

Elaborating more on the philosophy that one’s mind represents the “lonely house” and the ordinary manner of thinking in his generation.

The last stanza of this poem emphasizes that even though there are people that seem useless to the narrator, the person is glad that they are there. The lines, “And yet, in view of how many things,/ As sweet companions as might be had.” This line accentuates the need of the narrator to have companion regardless of the person.  Furthermore, this poem expresses that mind of an ordinary person that has the basic need to feel accompanied. This philosophy even correlates with the simple idea of a ghost wandering around humans wanting to feel connected to anything. Frost presented a very sad beauty of a poem that completely fascinated my mind because of the inner depth of how anyone naturally feels to be connected.

Why I Love "Ballad of the Landlord"

     I love Langston Hughes’ poetry because it is filled with settings of social injustice and inequality. Throughout his poems, Hughes sheds light on the inadequacies of our social structure through seemingly common experiences. Poems like “Madam and the Rent Man” and “Madam and the Phone Bill” exemplify this recurring theme in his work. For the purposes of this post I focused on the “Ballad of the Landlord”. “Ballad of the Landlord” was published in 1940, in it Hughes describes a situation in which a landlord, who has not kept up the building, is trying to get rent from a tenant who refuses to pay until the landlord fixes certain things in the house. Eventually the landlord’s threat of eviction infuriates the tenant to the point of threatening to physically assault the landlord. The poem closes with news headlines that read, “MAN THREATENS LANDLORD / TENANT HELD NO BAIL / JUDGE GIVES NEGRO 90 DAYS IN COUNTY JAIL” (31-33 Hughes). The theme resembles many of Hughes’ poems, in which a person of a lower financial status is railroaded and treated unfairly based on race and socioeconomic circumstances.

     The first thing that draws me into Hughes' poetry is his use of language. Hughes uses, for lack of a better term, real language. Hughes is able to do this because the subject matter is so important that it does not need haughty diction to dress it up. To do so would actually take away from the importance of the theme of the poem. Stanza five presents us with a great example of this when Hughes writes:

“Um-huh! You talking high and mighty.

Talk on – till you get through.

You ain’t gonna be able to say a word

If I land my fist on you. (17-20)

The speaker’s anger basically jumps off the page here. Hughes also juxtaposes this with the next stanza in which the landlord yells out:

“Police! Police!

Come and get this man!

He’s trying to ruin the government

And overturn the land! (21-24)

As readers we are immediately aware of the difference in educational status between the two characters due to Hughes’ use of language. Yet, from early in the poem we also know that the landlord is basically a slumlord, so without being explicit, Hughes is able to use language to show that education and socioeconomic status do not predict honest and respectable behavior. 

     The above is just one example of what makes Hughes' poetry dear to me. His focus on the plight of minorities and low-income living situations truly make Hughes a poet for the masses.