Poetry and Poetics–Lit 204

Amiri Baraka’s “As Agony. As Now” does not have a single line that isn’t tinted with suffering or a single stanza that doesn’t make readers’ skin crawl. The poem describes the feeling of being a stranger to your own body, as if your soul is a separate entity from your physical form. This work is riddled with disturbing diction and imagery, and perfectly is able to describe every human action in a perturbing way. Baraka describes the “fouled tunes that come in to his breath”, the “enclosure” of a body in which he is encaged in, and the “cold air blown through narrow blind eyes”. He also writes the word “flesh” 6 times and the word “pain” 4 times, which adds to the overall atmosphere of this poem. There are also many phrases that seem to contradict each other. The speaker speaks of the disgusting smells and feelings he gets in this body, and also questions if he feels pain.  Yet later in the poem he writes that “it has no feeling” just to on to say that “It burns the thing inside it. And that thing screams.” These contractions make the poem feel incredibly personal, as if readers are hearing the subconscious and conscious thoughts of an individual as they are having this horrible experience. This poem immediately reminded me of William Faulkner’s “As I Laying Dying” in which characters have a similar stream of consciousness as they try to overcome loss and piece together the thoughts in their mind. The form of this poem is partially disorganized. Some parenthesis aren’t finished, there are many enjambments and caesuras, stanzas have varying line numbers, and a stanza is broken up weirdly in line 23. Yet, there is also a flow through the poem, as the stanzas begin to grow and then shrink as the poem concludes. This shows the chaos that inhabits the structure of the human mind. I really like this poem because it (along with many other modern poems) can really lead to a plethora of different interpretations, all surrounding the minds path to organize thoughts surrounding a traumatizing experience. 

I love when art is referenced in poetry, so I immediately gravitated towards writing about “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” for my blog post. This poem really proposes a beautiful message, and begins with a clear purpose (that is only heightened when looking at the painting it is paired with). The first stanza alone is shocking in its redirection from the generic. Williams writes “According to Brueghel / when Icarus fell / it was spring”. This line was so jawing for me because it highlighted aspects about the infamous story of Icarus that are usually insignificant. The subject of this stanza is not Icarus — it is spring. This poems story is not set up to remind readers about the overused and cliche remark “Don’t fly too close to the sun” that is usually referred to when discussing Icarus. William’s discusses the “ordinary” events that went on when Icarus perished — and the same events that were not effected in the slightest by Icarus’s fall from the sky. To the “farmer [who] was ploughing”, the melting of Icarus’s beautiful wings and his plunge into the sea was completely unimportant. Williams even writes that the splash was “unnoticed” by those around. With Icarus being (arguably) one of the most famous characters in Greek mythology, it’s refreshing to remember that his death was as insignificant as it was infamous. It is also important to note that Williams wrote this poem after Brueghel’s painting, which is shown below. The painting is equally as impactful, as most viewers will glance at this painting and admire it for the beautiful landscape and entrancing colors — and not the flailing man drowning in the lower right corner. It is remarkable how poet and painter can create such a connection of emotion between two different mediums, with both producing the same message. Although I believe there are multiple messages to get from this painting and poem, I like to see this story in a more positive light. Life will continue to move on, and even an event like the fall of Icarus will remain unnoticed by many. While that insinuates that we as humans are insignificant against the plethora of things that are happening at any given time, it is heartening to think that there is so much happiness and light that can surround so much tragedy and despair. 

Hopkin’s “The Windhover” is such a unique poem, and requires more that a blog post to fully discuss all of the devices used in its lines. The poem describes a hovering bird — yet this bird is never just described as a simple animal. Witty diction creates stunning alliteration (“morning morning’s minion”, “daylight’s dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn”), and makes the bird seen regal and ethereal. The first stanza creates a description of the bird and ends with the speaker declaring that their heart “stirs” from hiding because of the mastery of the bird hovering. This stanza is relatively easy to follow in comparison to the second and final stanza. The speaker continues to use smart alliteration when discussing the beauty of the hovering bird, and also reminds himself that the bird will continue to complete this phenomenon for every day of its life (“O my chevalier! No wonder of it:”). Whether this is intended to mean that there is beauty in day-to-day occurrences or if it means something else entirely, “The Windhover” is a completely unique poem that pushes readers to think.

It would be almost impossible to glance at “Easter Wings” by George Herbert and not question its distinctive meter. I gravitated towards this poem because of the swells of each section of the poem, almost acting like waves in the sea. The poem’s title is targeted and distinctive. We first see the word “Easter”, which is arguably the most common symbol to address renewal and rebirth. The word “Wings” follows — which could be analyzed as a connection to the notorious wings of a phoenix bird, whose renewal allowed it to rise from the ashes. This combination creates a distinct message, as if Herbert is shouting at his readers to understand his poem’s purpose. The first line begins on a high, worshipping the Lord, who created men in “wealth and [abundance]”. Then we see a shift with one word — the infamous “Though”! This word creates a tone change, indicating the fall of mankind and the fall of the utopia God created. As man, the Lord, or both “decays” (line 3), the words per line also begin to “decay” (thin out), and readers are able to visually understand the loss represented in the poem. As the poem ages, a pattern emerges. The swells of the poem coincide with the present tone changes as the narrator addresses his emotion about his faith and about the history of the Lord. In the shortest (and most melancholy) lines, there is a repetitional phrase. Lines 5-6 read “Most poor: / With thee” and lines 15-16 read “Most thin. / With thee”. The first segment is referencing the Lord, and the second segment is referencing the narrator, but both end with the phrase “With thee”. This line has so much power in the context of the poem, especially because this line’s thinness should work as a depressing line. Yet it is the opposite; it is the epitome of hope, marking the point where the poem and the story begin to show happiness. Herbert uses “With thee” to say that to have faith in the Lord is to have an unbreakable connection with a higher power. This supporter is able to bring his followers out of the darkest of paths and reverse the “decaying” process in order to be at peace with oneself. We can see this fluctuation (longer lines/euphoric moments to shorter lines/moments of dismay) a total of 4 times — which I believe to be a perfect representation of the feelings of rebirth and deterioration that Herbert is discussing. The wavering of emotions in this poem are clear, yet this conflict marks for a more beautiful ending when the narrator “fixes his wings” (19) and “combine” with the Lord (16-17) in order to symbolically fly. The narrator even recognizes his struggles, saying that his “affliction[s]” will only advance his flight. We can see the connection of wings and birds from the title of the poem, which wraps up the message and makes this emotional poem end on a lovely note.