Naomi Shihab Nye Essays

Naomi Shihab Nye was born in St. Louis, Missouri in 1952. (Naomi Shihab Nye, Poetry Foundation n.p.). Her father was a Palestinian refugee and her mother an American of German and Swiss descent. Nye spent her adolescence in both Jerusalem and San Antonio, Texas (Naomi Shihab Nye, Poetry Foundation n.p.). Her experience of both cultural difference and different cultures has influenced much of her work (Naomi Shihab Nye, Poetry Foundation n.p.). Known for poetry that lends a fresh perspective to ordinary

In the personal narrative poem “Gate 4-A,” written by Naomi Shihab Nye, the narrator goes to the aid of an elderly Palestinian woman in the Albuquerque Airport, who is in worriment and distress. The Palestinian woman doesn’t understand English and becomes hysterical when she thinks that her flight for an important medical treatment was cancelled altogether. The theme of “Gate 4-A” is that compassion and kindness are contagious; they spread while making the world a happier place, little

Contemporary poet, Naomi Shihab Nye, illustrates the modern time period from 1985 to present in her poem, “The Traveling Onion” using imagery, symbolism, and personification to capture the diversity of culture in America. In her poem, Nye wrote, “the way the knife enters onion/and the onion falls apart on the chopping block,/a history revealed.” This quote illustrates the imagery Nye uses in order to create an image in the reader’s head that may have never been thought thoroughly before and can evoke

affect their thoughts, beliefs, and works. Especially if the person has two different cultural backgrounds as the Arab-American poet Naomi Shihab Nye. Naomi Shihab Nye is a poet from a Palestinian father and an American mother, her bicultural background shows in her poetry. The turning point in Nye 's life as a writer is when she visits her grandmother in Palestine at the age of fourteen, after that she starts to write about

And there are many Arab American poets, who expresses their personal thoughts through poetry. Naomi Shihab Nye is one of these poets who uses poetry to express her cultural and personal perspective. Naomi Shihab Nye is a poet from a Palestinian father and an American mother, her bi-cultural background shows in her poetry. The turning point in Nye 's life as a writer is when she visits her grandmother in Palestine at the age of fourteen

Naomi Shihab Nye focuses on the concept of solitary and independence in “The Boy and Egg”. Throughout the poem Nye uses alliterations, imagery and personification to create a literal situation. However, in “Famous” the author uses the poem to make the reader develop a new perspective on the definition of the word ‘famous’. The poem uses similes, irony, imagery and tone to show how the author views the world. The poem “The Boy and Egg” tells you a story about a child who lives near a farm.

Authors utilize different types of syntax in order to more effectively convey their message. The way words are organized into sentences can change the meaning of a poem so authors, such as Naomi Shihab Nye very carefully format the sentences. For example, the poem, “Daily”, does not follow a typical sentence structure of subject action then object. Instead the structure repeats itself from line 1 to line 18 by stating the object first and then introducing the pronoun subject and the action. In line

In the short story Gate A-4, written by Naomi Shihab Nye, the narrator of the story is supposed to board a flight to El Paso yet the flight is delayed, so an elderly Palestinian woman who is unable to understand English gets worried that she won’t be able to arrive at her destination to receive immediate medical attention. The narrator, who happens to speak Arabic, translates to the older woman in order to console her. This begins the beautiful friendship between the narrator and the older woman

“Making a fist" by Naomi Shihab Nye and "Lucinda Matlock" by Edgar Lee Masters are both about overcoming major obstacles in life to then go on and enjoy life. The two poems are similar in tone, theme, and irony. Both poems have a tone that could be described as reminiscent or nostalgic. In "Lucinda Matlock" the speaker is looking back on her life how she was happy and how she was "married and lived together [with her husband] for seventy years, enjoying working and raising twelve children

The selection “Shoofly Pie” by Naomi Shihab Nye is about a young girl struggling with grief. After the death of her mother, Mattie wasn’t sure what she was going to do for work. Getting a job at a local restaurant, Mattie threw herself into cooking, like she did for her late mother. She made new relationships at the restaurant, and she met others who knew the struggles that grief can cause a person. Between honoring her mother through cooking and relating to other co-workers about grief, she found

Analysis “Shoulders” by Naomi Shihab Nye. This poem sends the message to the reader by using metaphors, imagery, and alliteration showing that we all have responsibilities, some much bigger than others. The theme is something the readers can all relate to when the theme is about responsibilities and how important it is to be responsible for others. Nye’s metaphor shines a bright light on her poems main idea. “He carries the world’s most sensitive cargo”(6). Sleeping Child=the

Through time and difficulties you face, it can create or enforce your relationships. In the story “Gate A-4”, Naomi Shihab Nye was wandering through the airport terminal after she got informed that her flight had been delayed, until she hears an announcement saying, "anyone in the vicinity of gate A-4 that understands Arabic, please go to the gate." The theme starts to develop as Naomi decides to help the Palestinian lady in her own time, throughout the time they spend together, they start to create

The poem "Kindness" by Naomi Shihab Nye speaks about how you experience kindness and what it really is. The main point in this poem is that in order to experience people's kindness you need to experience hurt, sorrow, and loneliness. The author says that when you loose everything and have no one or thing that when kindness comes along it lifts you up "and then goes with you everywhere/ like a shadow or a friend" (33-34). When portraying this message the author uses a sad but hopeful tone to send

After reading “Gate A-4” by Naomi Shihab Nye I believe that the meaning of this passage is shown in the line “ This can still happen anywhere. Not everything is lost.” It shows that the author wants a helping community where food and cultural/tradition is shared. When this elderly women starts to cry in the middle of the airport because she had an important medical treatment, she thought that their flight was canceled, but she understood wrong their airplane was delayed. This women drops to the

“Making a Fist” is a poem by Naomi Shihab Nye that depicts a seven-year-old girl overcoming her sickness in the backseat of a car while her mother drives. This story is meant to explore themes of morality along with the strength that is resilience in the face of adversity. The poem is structured in free verse, all within 3 short stanzas. The speaker is the seven-year-old girl, who is presumed to be Naomi Shihab Nye herself in her youth. This poem confronts the complexities of death by prompting the

Erin Hanson: Reassurance in Flaws The name Erin Hanson is one many have not heard. The young poets ideas spread confidence, self love, and acceptance. Her young age allows her to connect with her audience in ways many her fellow poets can not. For example in her poem non-officially titled “People are not poetry” Hanson covers the many struggles of being human. However; instead of focusing on the negative, she turns the spotlight on accepting what makes each one of us different. This interesting

world is where we live life, make friends, learn from failure, and experience countless opportunities. The good will most likely outweigh the bad, and that is why parents should not shelter their children from experiencing life. In “Shoulders” by Naomi Shihab Nye, it does not show a toxic type of protection. It simply shows a man trying to protect his son and in the end it shows that he understands that he cannot protect his son forever. It is a healthy type of protection that this father portrays in

World of the Future, We Thristed by Naomi Shihab Nye tackles the significant impact humans have on the environment within the twenty-seven lines. In this poem, the speaker illustrates the lengths of littering and pollution and how our ignorance and selfishness have led to long-term environmental effects and dependence on urbanized technology. Throughout the poem, there are a plethora of strategies the speaker utilizes to convey the crucial role humans play in the mass environmental damage from littering

During the teenage years, many think that they know everything and no one else is correct. In the poem “Our Son Swears He Has 102 Gallons of Water in His Body,” by Naomi Shihab Nye, the speaker tells about how a boy thinks his opinion is correct and the opinions of his parents are wrong. The boy, because he believed his answer was correct, didn’t have a close connection to his parents. Being reassured of his answer by the teacher, the boy disregarded his parent’s thoughts. He completely does not

Son Swears he has 102 Gallons of Water in His Body” by Naomi Shihab Nye, a son argues with his parents about what the reader can only assume to be homework in the form of a mathematical problem yet still deals with them despite the knowledge gap. In this poem, the conflict first appears whenever the child and his parents start arguing over a school problem in which he “did the problem [in school] and [his] teacher said [he] was right” (Nye 3-4). Although he insists he is correct, his parents continue