Poetry Questions Essay

In Ralph Waldo Emerson’s work, â€Å"Nature†, the speaker forces the reader to analyze their core beliefs and values. The speaker asks, â€Å"why should we grope among the dry bones of the past, or put the living generation into masquerade out of its faded wardrobe? The sun shines today also†. By asking this simple question, the speaker is essentially asking the audience why they should accept the beliefs and traditions handed down to them through their ancestors instead of creating their own. This question is furthered when the speaker states, â€Å"There are new lands, new men, new thoughts. Let us demand our own works and laws and worship†. The speaker is making a call to his readers for a change in society. Rather than blindly accept the laws and beliefs from long gone ancestors, the speaker is challenging his audience to be independent thinkers, and follow their own path of discovery, rather than continue to be force fed hundred year old traditions. In the poem, â€Å"Apparently With No Surprise†, the speaker is admiring a flower and suddenly it dies. Through the language in the poem, it seems as though the speaker is questioning whether God oversees life and death within nature. In this poem, nature is portrayed as a brutal assassin, taking the life from an innocent and blooming flower. The Frost is named the murderer, but the speaker says that it has done so in â€Å"accidental power† while at play. The speaker proceeds to question whether there is a God that controls nature’s violent tendancies. In the last few lines of the poem, the speaker answers her own questions, by noting that God is approving of nature’s order, which is reflected in the line that reads, â€Å"The Sun proceeds unmoved to measure off another Day for an Approving God†. The tone of the poem suggests that the speaker things that God is just as malevolent as nature for allowing nature to take its course. 3. The most important characteristic of the landscape in â€Å"Desert Places† is the snow. Frost notes that the ground is â€Å"almost covered smooth in snow†, which gives the reader a sense of coldness and expansive nothingness in an environment that is typically warm and inviting. It seems as though Frost is comparing this desert to himself. By stating that the desert is a â€Å"blanker whiteness of benighted snow with no expression†, Frost gives the reader a sense of emptiness that not only is a characteristic of the snow, but also of how empty and emotionless he feels. Frost ties together the desert and his own emotions in the last few lines of the poem. Frost ties the description of a vast and barren desert with the feelings of emptiness and lack of emotion that he feels about his own life. By ending the poem with the line, â€Å"to scare myself with my own desert places†, Frost displays his fear at his absolute lack of emotion and emptiness. â€Å"Kitchenette Building† uses many terms to explain how life in this urban society feels. Gwendolyn Brooks uses the term â€Å"involuntary plan† to describe the situation that the black speaker is currently in. The â€Å"involuntary plan† describes shady real estate deals that created small, cramped apartments for black tenants from what were previously spacious apartments in white neighborhoods. The speaker is showing the reader how the slum lords have exploited the black tenants in this urban society. The speaker makes reference to the â€Å"garbage ripening in the hall†, which is another way in which the exploitation of the black tenant is made apparent – the simple maintenance of disposing of the trash is ignored by these shady landlords. The speaker also notes that â€Å"we wonder. But not well! Not for a minute!†, which indicates that she doesn’t have the time or the energy to meditate on the problem of exploitation, or any wa y to attempt to change it. As soon as the fifth member of the family emerges from the bathroom, her thoughts shift to more practical things, such as a warm bath. 5. In Allen Ginsberg’s work, â€Å"Howl†, he makes reference to Moloch in an attempt to criticize the society of 1950s America. Moloch refers to a biblical idol to which sacrifices of children were brought. By comparing 1950s American society to this bloodthirsty idol, Ginsberg is painting a clear picture of his view of the era that America had entered into at that time. Ginsberg paints prisons, apartments, and industries as all that is evil with society with the line that reads, â€Å"Moloch! Moloch! Robot apartments! invisible suburbs! skeleton treasuries! blind capitals! Demonic industries!†   Ginsberg is making the point that with the new industrialization of society, the forgotten artists, musicians, and creative thoughts are forgotten, and even given a negative connotation. Ginsberg makes it clear that he believes that the industry with their factories and warehouses only create more of a diversion from the artistic world of colors and music. This point is made though the line that reads, â€Å"Moloch whose factories dream and croak in the fog! Moloch whose smokestacks and antennae crown the cities!† As an artist himself, Ginsberg is forcing society to recognize the apparent evils of the industrialization of his society.6. In Sarah Orne Jewett’s work, â€Å"A White Heron†, the main character, Sylvia is a young girl, who has a love for animals. She is befriended by a hunter, who is tracking a white heron that he intends to kill and add to his collection of stuffed birds. Sylvia perches in a giant pine tree very early in the morning, searching for the heron to make her new friend happy. Sylvia finds the bird nested on a branch not far from where she sits. The bird flies away and Sylvia runs home to tell the hunter where the bird is. Upon returning to her house, however, she has a change of heart and realizes that she cannot tell the hunter where the heron has gone. Though Sylvia obviously has a crush on the hunter, she allows him to go on his way without giving him the location of the heron. Though she is only a child, Sylvia has made a very adult-like choice by electing to save the life of the white heron, and not allowing herself to be coerced into confessing the bird’s whereabouts to the attractive man. Even though the hunter offered Sylvia a $10.00 reward for helping him find the heron, she still chooses to keep silent about the heron’s location. Sylvia realizes that she values life more than any reward she could receive. In William Cullen Bryant’s work, â€Å"To A Waterfowl†, the speaker views a bird in flight and seems to feel an almost spiritual connection with the bird. The speaker admires the bird’s ability to continue on its way, day or night, even with the threat of being hunted by man. The speaker says that, â€Å"All day thy wings have fann’d at that far height, the cold thin atmosphere: Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land, though the dark night is near†. In this line, that speaker is almost admiring the bird’s dedication to continuing on its path until it reaches its destination, without stopping because it is tired. This gives the speaker a sense of pushing forward even when things seem hard or one is weary. The speaker watches the bird and imagines it reaching its destination and finding a â€Å"summer home, and rest†, which is the bird’s reward for its dedication. The bird disappears into the sky, and the speaker feels that the bird has been cared for by God. This thought makes the speaker realize that if God can care and provide for a bird, God can certainly guide the path of the speaker.