How do poets convey their central idea of bonds between family and acceptance of new beginnings in the poem “Praise song for my mother” by Grace Nichols and “Long Distance” by Tony Harrison The poem Praise song for my mother, written by Grace Nichols, a South American poet, explores a mother’s endless providing for her children, the basic requirement and importance of mothers and the love between a mother and her child. The persona is remembering and reflecting on their relationship throughout the poem. It also touches on topics of death and migration. The central theme in the poem Long distance by Tony Harrison, is about acceptance of death and dealing with grief. He talks briefly about society's expectations of bereavement, hardship of loss and moving on. Both Praise song for my mother and Long Distance have the themes of parental relationship, love and reflection. They both also have similarities in central themes of letting go, moving on and death of parents. The title long distance might be a euphemism for death. In Long Distance the persona’s father is still in disbelief about his wife's death and hasn’t been able to let go and accept. He kept his role in their relationship and continued to do routine activities as he ‘kept her slippers warming’ and ‘put hot water bottles by her bed’. The poet uses the warm objects as a representation of his ‘raw love’. The father has acknowledged the persona’s embarrassment for his as he ‘clear’s away her things’ and pretended to ‘look alone’ for everyone. This displays societies judgmental and …show more content…
The imagery for the first and second stanza is quite different and ambiguous contrastingly the visuals for the third and fourth stanza are more dominant representations of a mother and relatable. They also evoke images of a tropical island