Mary Oliver
Alligator Poem


I knelt down
at the edge of the water,
and if the white birds standing
in the tops of the trees whistled any warning
I didn’t understand,
I drank up to the very moment it came
crashing toward me,
its tail flailing
like a bundle of swords,
slashing the grass,
and the inside of its cradle-shaped mouth
gaping,
and rimmed with teeth—
and that’s how I almost died
of foolishness
in beautiful Florida.
But I didn’t.
I leaped aside, and fell,
and it streamed past me, crushing everything in its path
as it swept down to the water
and threw itself in,
and, in the end,
this isn’t a poem about foolishness
but about how I rose from the ground
and saw the world as if for the second time,
the way it really is.
The water, that circle of shattered glass,
healed itself with a slow whisper
and lay back
with the back-lit light of polished steel,
and the birds, in the endless waterfalls of the trees,
shook open the snowy pleats of their wings, and drifted away,
while, for a keepsake, and to steady myself,
I reached out,
I picked the wild flowers from the grass around me—
blue stars
and blood-red trumpets
on long green stems—
for hours in my trembling hands they glittered
like fire.


When reading this I was really intrigued about how informal it actually seems, yet it still works. It is almost as if the poem is a short story just in poem form. It is a major turning point when she writes "this isn't a poem about foolishness". At that point the reader realizes that this poem is about a second chance, and then can make the biblical connection to resurection. This poem is really about having a second chance, and realization about how good things actually are until you think they are gone.

In this poem Mary Oliver writes about having a second chance and the importance of realizing what you have. She uses the power and beauty of nature to get this point across. At first the destructive power that nature withholds is portrayed by the alligator. This gator nearly takes the life of the narrator but doesn't. This shows how there is also room for second chances. The beauty of nature is portrayed. After nearly losing her life she see the beauty within her life. Everything seems so different to her, which shows how now through her close experience she has changed so much. This is a useful technique to use: the power held within nature.

After Basho

Carolyn Kizer


After Basho

Tentatively, you
slip onstage this evening,
pallid famous moon.


The tittle of this poem makes me believe that after an event or person called Basho that somebody was able to come and take the stage now. I quickly looked it up to find that Basho was a haiku poet and was very respected and skilled at what he did. Carolyn Kizer is showing her respect for him and realizes he was the big name in the haiku area of the time. She is saying now that he is gone others can finally slip onto the stage and take their place and try to shine like he did.

Kizer's use of metaphor in this poem is a very useful tool that makes this poem meaningful. She compares "you", an unknown writer, to the pale moon. It's as if saying that you haven't had time to shine bright yet because this other guy has been so marvelous and bright that everyone has been absorbed with him. Now however, since he is gone, other poets can "slip onstage" and become brighter in the eyes of readers and writers because this once bright sun is now gone these people that are compared to the moon can step in and try to fulfill his place.

Richard Brautigan


Window's Lament

It's not quite cold enough
to go borrow some firewood
from the neighbors.


This poem is very interesting because it isn't your traditional haiku about nature. Brautigan took the structure of a haiku but used a different theme than what haiku's usually are. The poem however still sticks to the concentrated point, which is hard to vary from with only 17 syllables to use. I liked this poem though because it is about his life or peoples' lives and not about nature. It is more psychological than it is natural. Overall I think the idea that he went with in this haiku is effective because it is unique.

The idea that Brautigan uses in this poem that I would like to use is using haiku for daily life in psychological ways, not necessarily in a natural sense. Also just using haiku poems; I want to start writing more haiku style poems than free-style. I'm glad I was able to come across Brautigan's haiku because it has inspired me and solidified the fact that I want to write haiku. The idea of using the structure of a haiku but describing a situation other than what occurs in nature is a unique way to go about writing a haiku and I would like to try it.

Natural History

Natural History
E.B. White


The spider, dropping down from twig,
Unfolds a plan of her devising,
A thin premeditated rig
To use in rising.

And all that journey down through space,
In cool descent and loyal hearted,
She spins a ladder to the place
From where she started.

Thus I, gone forth as spiders do
In spider's web a truth discerning,
Attach one silken thread to you
For my returning.


This letter (in the form of a poem) was written to "Katherine" from the "King Edward Hotel, Toronto". I'm not sure what that means, but the fact that it's a letter shows some significance. It means that these two people were communicating with one another, most likely on good terms. I would even go as far to say that they were lovers. There is an overall sound to the poem which makes it seem like that, such as "attach one silken thread to you for my returning". This sets the poems tone and automatically makes it come across as a love poem.

An effective strategy that E.B. White characterizes the spider as a woman. This is a metaphor to human life, as it is the woman who is stereotyped to stay at home while the man goes out and does his thing. It also shows how a spider, or woman, can be conniving. They seem harmless but trap you in their web. This poem shows a feminist view, but from a male narrarator. This is powerful because it is a view that is sometimes neglected but showing it from the oppositions view point in a positive manner makes it work really well and unique.

Those Winter Sundays

Robert Hayden
Those Winter Sundays


Sundays too my father got up early
And put his clothes on in the blueback cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather made
banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.

I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he'd call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house,

Speaking indifferently to him,
who had driven out the cold
and polished my good shoes as well.
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices?



In this poem Robert Hayden's appreciation for his father shows. He must have had a somewhat awkward connection with him because he makes it evident that he cares about what his dad does but never really is able to repay him, even if it is just keeping the house warm. This shows a part of who Hayden is as a person because he is able to appreciate a small thing that many people over look like keeping a house warm in the winter. His dad is up early every morning looking after his family and Hayden realizes this and looks up to his father for it greatly.


A strategy that Hayden uses in this poem is discribing the importance of something that is often overlooked in everyday life. This things which are often under played like this can have an unknown affect on people if they are put unto a pedestal and shown the signifcance of them. This can help a writer because they can write about a familiar topic of importance to them that many other people would ordinarily not understand. This can give people insight to the troubles in the lives of other people than just their own. Writing about personal sentimental stories can be effective because it lets others feel how the author does.

Island
Langston Hughes


Wave of sorrow,
Do not drown me now:

I see the island
Still ahead somehow.

I see the island
And its sands are fair:

Wave of sorrow,
Take me there.



This poem feels as if it is a metaphor for not giving up hope. Langston Hughes most likely faced racism and had to deal with it throughout his life, and his poetry may have helped him get through it. In this poem he is saying there is always that place that is good, and you should not give up till you get there. However, the means of getting there may be rough, such as "waves of sorrow". It may take pain to get there, but what he is saying is that you must ride that sorrow and stick it out to get to that "fair" place.


Using metaphors how Hughes uses them in the poem "Island" can be a useful tool. Metaphors can make overused topics seem new because it is a unique approach. In this case he uses and island symbolize hope and waves to symbolize a journey. In the end you can see how it is all a metaphor for racism. Using metaphor can also let you write about topics that may not be acceptable but if you "screen" it using metaphor you can acomplish what you want. Using metaphors can help enhance the meaning behind a story or poem when used properly.

The End and the Beginning
Wislawa Szymborska


After every war
someone has to clean up.
Things won't
straighten themselves up, after all.

Someone has to push the rubble
to the side of the road,
so the corpse-filled wagons
can pass.

Someone has to get mired
in scum and ashes,
sofa springs,
splintered glass,
and bloody rags.

Someone has to drag in a girder
to prop up a wall,
Someone has to glaze a window,
rehang a door.

Photogenic it's not,
and takes years.
All the cameras have left
for another war.

We'll need the bridges back,
and new railway stations.
Sleeves will go ragged
from rolling them up.

Someone, broom in hand,
still recalls the way it was.
Someone else listens
and nods with unsevered head.
But already there are those nearby
starting to mill about
who will find it dull.

From out of the bushes
sometimes someone still unearths
rusted-out arguments
and carries them to the garbage pile.

Those who knew
what was going on here
must make way for
those who know little.
And less than little.
And finally as little as nothing.

In the grass that has overgrown
causes and effects,
someone must be stretched out
blade of grass in his mouth
gazing at the clouds.


This poem must be based on events that happened in Wislawa Szymborska's life. She writes as if she has first hand knowledge on this subject and actually knows what it is like to recover from war. This poem very easily could have been written to help her vent her frustrations of the war. It is obvious she is bitter because she says how new people come in and think they know what happened there, but really they are just clueless. This poem is very effective at portraying the views of the people who feel that they have been cheated out of something, such as their land.


In this poem Wislawa Szymborska uses first hand knowledge to add emotion to her poem. Whenever you can add first hand knowledge into something you can always make it more meaningful. In this case she states how the people who are left in rubble must fix it themselves while staying out of the way "those who know little" of that place. It is effective because it adds real emotion into the story which makes the reader feel sympathetic towards her, but also feel disgusted by those who would come in and try to take over something that was once good. By using her first hand experiences she has added a feeling of real emotion into her poem, which is able to make readers better connect with the poem