Questions tagged [poetry]
This tag should be used on questions about poetry in general or about any specific poem. Please use this tag with the appropriate author tag, and, if applicable, the language tag (such as [french-literature].
1
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1answer
56 views
Opening lines of Gwendolyn Brooks' poem “Riot”
Please explain the following opening lines of Gwendolyn Brooks's poem "Riot":
John Cabot, out of Wilma, once a Wycliffe,
all whitebluerose below his golden hair,
wrapped richly in right linen ...
-3
votes
0answers
19 views
Once Upon a Time by Gabriel Okara [on hold]
Are there any poetic devices in the following lines of the poem 'Once Upon a Time by Gabriel Okara? If yes, what are they?
But only laugh with their teeth.
"Feel at home!", "Come again":
I ...
1
vote
1answer
49 views
Significance of rising/falling meter
If I am analyzing a poem and I realize that it has rising meter, what does that say about the poem. Like do happy tone poems have rising meters whereas sad poems have falling meter?
4
votes
0answers
24 views
Why did Avicenna write his medical textbook in verse?
Avicenna (980-1037) was a Persian writer and scientist who is regarded as one of the founders of modern medicine. I found it interesting to discover that his textbook on medicine was written in the ...
1
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0answers
23 views
The House Was Quiet And The World Was Calm by Wallace Stevens quote interpretation
I'll give the whole poem for context, but I'm having trouble making complete sense of a line in the poem.
What exactly does Stevens mean by the phrase "wanted much most to be / The scholar to whom ...
6
votes
1answer
85 views
Poem about bedtime story for witch's child
I read this poem in the 5th or 6th grade or so, so that'd be 2012-2014 (somewhere in there). It was out of some packet copied out of a book for this language arts extension thing (I remember the book ...
1
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0answers
13 views
What does Lorca mean by ‘the oppressed reds’ and ‘garnet violence’ in his poem ‘The King of Harlem’?
I've already asked one question on this poem and I did think to include this question along with it but decided against it as the poem is quite long, though of course not as long as some ancient epics ...
5
votes
1answer
54 views
What did Lorca mean by ‘crocodiles’ in his poem ‘The King of Harlem’?
The poet Federico García Lorca, when he was studying at Colombia University visited Harlem with a friend of his, Nella Larsen, a black novelist. It made a tremendous impression upon him and its ...
2
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0answers
34 views
Help finding poem about a red tide coming in which mentions “memory”
I'm trying to find a poem. I thought it was a Mary Oliver poem, but I can't find it when searching the few words I know along with her name.
The poem talks about a red tide coming in. There is a part ...
0
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0answers
25 views
Help finding poem about a red tide coming in [duplicate]
I'm trying to find a poem. I thought it was a Mary Oliver poem, but I can't find it when searching the few words I know along with her name.
The poem talks about a red tide coming in. There is a ...
2
votes
0answers
47 views
What is the effect of using “silver” to describe the “horn” in “Madman's Song” by William Rose Benét?
Here is the poem "Madman's Song" by William Rose Benét:
Better to see your cheek grown hollow,
Better to see your temple
worn,
Than to forget to follow, follow,
After the sound of a silver
...
3
votes
2answers
73 views
What do these lines mean in Tennyson's poem “Northern Farmer - Old Style”?
What does
But summun ’ull come ater meä mayhap wi’ ’is kittle o’ steam
Huzzin’ an’ maäzin’ the blessed feälds wi’ the Divil’s oaän teäm.
mean in modern English?
2
votes
1answer
32 views
Symbolism in “The Jewel of the Secret Treasury”?
The poem "The Jewel of the Secret Treasury" by the famous Persian poet Hafez reads very much like a love poem, but I'm failing to pick up on the precise details of the metaphor:
The jewel of the ...
2
votes
1answer
50 views
Writing/Poetry technique - Requiring reader to have prior knowledge
In the poem "The Red Wheelbarrow" by William Carlos Williams, for the reader to infer the context of the poem - why so much depends on the red wheelbarrow, the reader has to know that William Carlos ...
0
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0answers
104 views
What do these lines mean in the poem “We The Women” By Grace Nichols?
I need an explanation for what Grace Nichols is trying to say in the following lines from her poem "We the Women":
We the women who cut clear fetch dig sing
We the women making something from ...
8
votes
0answers
49 views
Who is the author of this contradictory poem starting “The night was dark and stormy”?
Does anyone know the name of or the author of the poem below? My grandfather used to say it all of the time and I would like to read it at his funeral. It's very silly and goes something like this:
...
4
votes
1answer
47 views
Does Blake appeal to his readers' faith in the last stanza of “Holy Thursday”?
Here is the poem "Holy Thursday" from Songs of Experience by William Blake:
Is this a holy thing to see,
In a rich and fruitful land?
Babes reduced to misery,
Fed with cold and usurious hand.
...
0
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0answers
39 views
What does this phrase mean, “your touch left sweet accord in my frown”?
I recently read a piece of writing:
"your touch left a sweet accord in my frown"
Is this the right usage of the word accord? Am I missing something?
2
votes
1answer
69 views
What is the tone of “Spring” by Gerard Manley Hopkins?
Here is the poem "Spring" by Gerard Manley Hopkins:
Nothing is so beautiful as Spring–
When weeds, in wheels,
shoot long and lovely and lush;
Thrush’s eggs look little
low ...
4
votes
1answer
39 views
Why is God a “harshener”? What does this mean?
In Robert Hayden's poem "The Ballad of Nat Turner", the word "harshener" appears twice in reference to God/Jehovah:
In scary night I wandered, praying,
Lord God my harshener,
speak to me ...
1
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0answers
22 views
What does flying represent in “O Daedalus, Fly Away Home”?
In "O Daedalus, Fly Away Home", Robert Hayden makes reference to flying back to Africa. In the second to last stanza, he says:
My gran. he flew back to Africa,
just spread his arms and flew ...
6
votes
1answer
138 views
How does the editor know that seven lines are missing from Wordsworth's Home at Grasmere?
The Wordsworth edition The Major Works, edited by Stephen Gill and published by Oxford University Press in 1984 (and revised later) was the first
selection of Wordsworth's work (...) in which the ...
5
votes
1answer
335 views
In the Sonnet 29 by Shakespeare, does the speaker pity himself over lack of skill as an artist or contentment?
Here is the "Sonnet 29" by Shakespeare.
When in disgrace with fortune and men's eyes,
I all alone beweep my
outcast state,
And trouble deaf heaven with my bootless cries,
And
look upon ...
2
votes
1answer
47 views
What does “rushy bed” mean in this context?
The poem 'The Song of the Reed' by Rumi includes the lines:
Hearken to this Reed forlorn,
Breathing, even since 'twas torn
From its rushy bed, a strain
Of impassioned love and pain.
(From ...
0
votes
0answers
35 views
What does the poet Sukanta Bhattacharya mean when he said e has to make room for the newborn?
Why does the poet here want to clean up this squalid earth and make room for them when everybody in this world is running after wealth, glamour, glory, fame and egotistical nature's distortion? Did ...
1
vote
0answers
14 views
How does Dee Raain use the Mirrors to highlight negative human traits in the poem “Mirror of Truth”?
The poem "Mirror of Truth" by Dee Raain is as follows:
What is seen in the mirror is nothing more than a person with lies and hate.
With sadness and traits
Of discrimination and disgrace.
...
2
votes
0answers
16 views
Why did O’Shaughnessy write Ode?
Are there any theories on what motivated O’Shaughnessy to write Ode (also called 'We are the Music Makers') ?
Basically, he was not a "world-forsaker" himself. I read that he worked as a ...
2
votes
1answer
215 views
What is the meaning of these lines about love from “Desiderata”?
What is the message being delivered through these lines in "Desiderata" by the poet Max Ehrmann?
Especially do not feign affection
Neither be cynical about love;
for in the face of all aridity ...
2
votes
0answers
53 views
What is the difference between emotions and feelings in Wordsworth's Preface to Lyrical Ballads?
In the Preface to the second edition of Lyrical Ballads (1800), Wordsworth famously wrote that
all good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: (...).
He later adds (my emphasis):
...
3
votes
1answer
105 views
Does anybody know who wrote this poem, or where it is from?
I saw a poem on my friend's desktop background on his laptop, and took a screenshot of it because I thought it was cool. In fact, it was a poem.
Does anybody know who wrote it, or where it is from?
...
11
votes
3answers
252 views
Does “The Soul selects her own Society” by Emily Dickinson have a simile?
Here is the poem "The Soul selects her own Society" by Emily Dickinson.
The Soul selects her own Society —
Then — shuts the Door —
To her divine Majority —
Present no more —
Unmoved — ...
4
votes
1answer
51 views
Why is John Betjeman's poem set on the A30 in particular?
John Betjeman's poem "Meditation on the A30" is about a man who is fuming at his wife and driving recklessly. Everything described in the poem itself is fairly universal, could take place anywhere, so ...
4
votes
1answer
77 views
Is the man about to die in “Meditation on the A30”?
John Betjeman's poem "Meditation on the A30" is about a man driving his car and fuming about his unloving wife. In the final verse, he finally turns to action:
"You're barmy or plastered, I'll pass ...
5
votes
1answer
55 views
References in the first stanza of Amiri Baraka's poem “Somebody Blew Up America”?
In the poem "Somebody Blew Up America" by the African-American poet Amiri Baraka, he references a few people at the end of the first stanza:
They say it's some terrorist
some barbaric
A ...
1
vote
0answers
15 views
Is there any significance to the choice of similes for poetry in “Some Like Poetry”?
The poem "Some Like Poetry" by Polish writer Wislawa Szymborska is a musing lament about the unpopularity of poetry among the general population. The middle verse consists of a series of similes which ...
1
vote
1answer
25 views
Relevance of Findlay's poem 'Stolen' to Hopkinson's novel Midnight Robber
Nalo Hopkinson's novel Midnight Robber (published in 2000) is prefaced by the poem "Stolen" by David Findlay. According to the novel's colophon, the poem's copyright is dated 1997. However, according ...
3
votes
1answer
50 views
What's the implied meaning of this poem by Russell Edson?
My friends are discussing what's the implied meaning of this poem:
Fire Is Not a Nice Guest
Some people feel like it insinuates a futile effort to save people around. But I think this is not accurate. ...
1
vote
0answers
179 views
Why is Allen Ginsberg's “Howl” dedicated to Carl Solomon specifically?
The poem "Howl" by Allen Ginsberg (which can be read online) is partly a savage general commentary on society and partly an expression of solidarity for the institutionalised fellow writer Carl ...
7
votes
1answer
76 views
What is the relevance of the title of Nalo Hopkinson's “A Raggy Dog, a Shaggy Dog”?
I've just read Nalo Hopkinson's short story "A Raggy Dog, a Shaggy Dog" (available for free online from Apex Magazine). It's an odd, quirky tale about an orchid-loving lady who's constantly setting ...
2
votes
0answers
22 views
Does Shakespeare steer the reader's sympathy towards Venus or towards Adonis?
In the narrative poem Venus and Adonis, Shakespeare reuses a story from Ovid's Metamorphoses (which he often used as a source of inspiration), but gives it an original spin: Venus's desire is ...
4
votes
1answer
171 views
Interpretation of some lines in The Dolphins by Carol Ann Duffy
In the poem "The Dolphins" (see the summary on Beaming Notes), what does the following line mean:
"for the world will not deepen to dream in".
I am unable to understand the usage of "dream in"
...
3
votes
1answer
84 views
How many Elizabethan or Jacobean manuscripts of Shakespeare sonnets have come down to us?
When Thomas Thorpe published Shake-speares Sonnets [sic!] in 1609, the sonnets (or at least a subset of them) had already circulated in manuscript for some time. Francis Meres already mentioned these ...
6
votes
2answers
74 views
Style of poetry that plays with typographic rivers
In typography, rivers, or rivers of white, are gaps in typesetting, which appear to run through a paragraph of text, due to a coincidental alignment of spaces.
(https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/River_(...
2
votes
1answer
50 views
Analysis of a self-written stanza in terms of meter?
A long time ago I used to write poetry, and there was one particular stanza that has always stuck with me and seemed inherently rhythmic, but I’m not familiar with the relevant terminology and so I’m ...
10
votes
1answer
281 views
Meaning of “may I be twice damned for a bank-clerk or store hand” in “I hight Don Quixote”, a poem by Jack Parsons
From I Hight Don Quixote by Jack Parsons:
They said I was crazy, ambiguous, lazy,
disgusting, fantastic, obscene;
So I hied for my sagebrush and cactus and corn mush,
To see if the air was ...
10
votes
4answers
298 views
Meaning of “And do not drop in for an after-loss” in Shakespeare's sonnet 90
Sonnet 90 by Shakespeare:
Then hate me when thou wilt; if ever, now;
Now, while the world is bent my deeds to cross,
Join with the spite of fortune, make me bow,
And do not drop in for an ...
1
vote
1answer
68 views
Is this a pararhyme?
"Halted", "Fed" and "Eased" from first stanza of "Spring Offensive" by Wilfred Owen.
Halted against the shade of a last hill
They fed, and, lying easy, were at ease;
And, finding comfortable ...
4
votes
1answer
50 views
Looking for a poem by Simon Armitage
I'm struggling to find a poem by Simon Armitage where he goes on a tour about him in disguise only to find that the tour guide doesn't know much about him. What was its name and what collection is it ...
1
vote
1answer
26 views
Where can I find the text of the poem “Climbing Tintagel” by (I think) Vicki Feaver?
I have lost one of my favourite poems, Climbing Tintagel, which I think is by Vicki Feaver. I read it in a library book that had works by three (women) poets many years ago. I can't find it online ...
1
vote
1answer
70 views
What does the top of the bird-catcher's head look like?
In The New Yorker issue of 13 February 2013, Brad Leithauser discussed some of Robert Graves's love poems, including the quatrain "Love Without Hope". (I think the poem is still copyrighted, even ...
