The poem, Useless Boys,is one that portrays a feeling of indignation, rebellion and finally, understanding by two boys who grew up with bitter views of their fathers’ onerous jobs. The narrator believes that the only reason his father stays at his job is for the money. In his naivety the son does not realize that at times living selfishly is the way things have to be. Sometimes commitments are made in a self-sacrificial and cowardly manner. No matter how “wrecking” his father’s career, he stays in order to provide for his family.
Love is a concept missing from the majority of the book. The word love is mentioned numerous times but is not meaningful until Equality and Liberty bond over the understanding of the word and how they share the feeling of love with each other. When the word love is mentioned in chapters 1-10, it is used as a way of life, in the way that you are meant to love your brothers and the society you live in without question. It is not until chapter 11 when Equality realizes the importance of the word and how it is you who chooses the ones you love. In Equality’s words, “I shall choose only such as please me, and them I shall love and respect, but neither command nor obey.”
The generalization of love is often correlated with sex and/or sexual attractiveness; this is depicted throughout the media and their heavy sexual messages. Findley uses characters to show how a virgin mind tries to grasp the concepts of “love” and “sex”, “but what he saw so confused him that he stood there of his own volition – desperately trying to comprehend. There were actually two naked people…whoever it was who was there was standing in the middle of the floor hitting whoever else was there – striking out with all their force” (Findley, 39). Robert Ross in this situation has a hard time understanding the concept of “making love”, and is confused as to how the act of sex is a form of love in any way, he viewed it to be very physical and more like a battle than an act of love. Findley further supports this initial innocence or virgin mind of Robert when he says, “He’d never even dreamed of such a thing – of being hit and wanting to be hit.
The essay will consider the poem 'Practising' by the poet Mary Howe. It will explore how this poem generates its meaning and focus by analysing its techniques, metaphorical construct and its treatment of memory. The poem can primarily be seen to be a poem of missed opportunity. In this way is comes to form, alongside other poems of Howe's a study about a certain kind of loss and the recuperative efforts of memory, alongside the certainty of the failure of this recuperation. The paper will begin by giving a context to the poem with regard to Howe's life and work and will then proceed to analyse it directly, drawing attention to how it can be seen to fulfil this thesis about its content and meaning.
The characters perceptions of the meaning of love differ vastly, leading them to lose sight of love’s meaning or purpose.
Always Something More Beautiful “Always Something More Beautiful” is a poem by Stephen Dunn, born in Forest Hills, NY. I got attracted to this poem, because it reminded me when I was at the Regionals for a Cross-Country race and reflected how humans’ life can be fair or beautiful. The cluster “time, clock, finish” clarifies for a measurement that refers to a competitive race.
Love is an essential part of human lives. The society in Anthem does not support the action of love which helps create a collective society. “We raised our head and stepped back. For we did not understand what had made us do this and we were afraid to understand it.” (Rand 57-58).
Friendship is strong and can last a lifetime. In John Green's “Freak the Geek “a girl has Has problems in Hoover Prep School with older girls. She uses the power of friendship to get through tough times with her best friend. Lauren makes in through challenges and the struggles of Hoover Prep School with the power of friendship. This friendship leads to her being able to cope with the school and helps her build bravery at the same time.
The love is categorized as a deeming and damning affection therefore mastering the hardship of what love is or is perceived to be. Looking at the first stanza, one is able to notice that it starts off very romantically. In line 1 the poet, Cynthia Zarin, refers to her man as ‘My heart’ and ‘my dove’. ‘My heart’ indicates how much the poet’s lover means to her as a heart is sustenance for life. The poet also makes it clear that the love is pure in line 1 by referring to her lover as
The Constant Contemplation of Sharon Olds’ “Sex without Love” This poem dramatizes the conflict between the speakers opinions on sex, opposed to others. In this poem, Olds presents a speaker who is contemplating the mentalities and thought processes of people who are able to have sex without love, compared to themselves. Although no first person dialogue is presented in the poem, contrasting statements and implications of phrases used highlight how the speaker feels about the subject. The theme of the poem is largely one of personal contemplation and of human emotion.
The short story “What We Talk about When We Talk about Love” by Raymond Carver is about four friends- Laura, Mel, Nick, and Terri, gathering on a table and having a conversation. As they start to drink, the subject abruptly comes to “love.” Then, the main topic of their conversation becomes to find the definition of love, in other word to define what exactly love means. However, at the end, they cannot find out the definition of love even though they talk on the subject for a day long. Raymond Carver in “What We Talk about When We Talk about Love” illustrates the difficulty of defining love by using symbols such as heart, gin, and the sunlight.
When the reader goes to find deeper meaning in her poems, it comes out to be a very personal and emotional piece of writing. Her poem “Sex Without Love” can connect the reader personally with society. A lot of people in the world are obsessed with the act of having sex. Olds shows the contrast between coldness and physical heat. (McGiveron).
The poem A Step Away From Them by Frank O’Hara has five stanzas written in a free verse format with no distinguishable rhyme scheme or meter. The poem uses the following asymmetrical line structure “14-10-9-13-3” while using poetic devices such as enjambment, imagery, and allusion to create each stanza. A Step Away From Them occurs in one place, New York City. We know this because of the lines, “On/ to Times Square, / where the sign/blows smoke over my head” (13-14) and “the Manhattan Storage Warehouse.”
Conflict is a big theme and many poems and texts have been written on this topic, but two of the most well done and most expressive poems about this topics are “Out of the Blue” and “The Charge of the Light Brigade”. Even though the topic is the same the two authors, Simon Armitage and Alfred, Lord Tennyson, present the theme with different approaches, one about the innocent, one about the ones that chose to get involved In the conflict. The first poem, “Out of the blue”, is about the terrorist acts on 9/11 and the position that the ordinary people were putting in. The people that have been caught in the two towers were ordinary people going to their jobs and doing their daily routines and they were definitely not expecting what happened.
Love can exist as affection, infatuation, obsession, pleasure and in many other ways, as love is abstract. Hence, there is no one single interpretation of love. Love is a theme that has been embedded into language and literature over the centuries, yet due to the ever changing perception of love people continue to search for a universal definition of love. Poems are able to showcase the inner feelings and desires of a poet as well as their own unique views on love. Nevertheless, through poems “La Belle Dame sans Merci” by John Keats, “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning, “Mother in a Refugee Camp” by Chinua Achebe, “The day is gone, and all its sweets are gone!”