A Home is More Than a House: An Explication of Emotions in Lisa Parker’s “Snapping Beans” Leaving for college can be very humbling, but also very frightening at the same time. For many students, this transition is the first time they will have experienced the, so called, “real world.” This is in fact the case for the speaker in Lisa Parker’s poem, “Snapping Beans” whom has just returned home, “from school, from the North,” (line 5). In Parker’s poem, there is an evident theme that emphasizes that home is where the heart is. She elucidates this theme very well through her use of symbolism and characterization. To begin, there are several symbols within the poem that epitomize this message. The hickory leaf at the end of this poem is a symbolic …show more content…
She characterizes the student through not only her thoughts, but also her feelings. For example, she says she was splitting herself apart “with the slow-simmering guilt of being happy” (line 37). This shows that the student’s heart is evidently happier in the North, but she is just frightful to show it because she does not believe her family will approve of it. Another example is how she utilizes powerful words to describe her feelings such as “heartsick” (line 27) and “acidic holes” (line 34). These words show that she has very muddled emotions about her new manner of living in college. While she is very troubled due to her accent and the changes that were being made, she also feels very delighted with her new life. The grandma is characterized through the way she says, “It’s funny how things blow loose like that” (line 44), this shows that she is wise on this subject and she knows what the young adult is going through. The reason she asks, “ How’s school a-goin’?” (line 15) is because she can tell the students feelings and she wants her to express them to her. The grandma realizes that the girl likes it up north and she just wants her to be happy. Parker’s characterization of each of these individuals very heavily reveals the