I thought we were suppost to link this to something on the blackboard but nobody else has. so here is my choice for best blog. I like m1ssyou’s blog. She had interesting and well thought out analysises. This person’s posts weren’t short at all. They used a good variety of works and poets. Nothing bugged me more than people who used more than 2 poems from the same poet.

One poet I am a huge fan of is Maya Angelou. I think her work is very inspiring.  One poem by her that I love is Still I rise.

http://www.poemhunter.com/poem/still-i-rise/

I found this poem to be about self confidence and that is something that everyone can relate too. Although in this poem she is talking about her confidence in her self as a woman of color.  I like how she says things like “cause I walk like i’ve got oil wells pumping in my living room.  She says she walks like she has something of value and i think that something of value is her freedom. 

The fourth and fifth stanzas I found interesting as well. She addressing those who thing she shouldn’t have confidence and asks them if they would rather see her upset and sulking. The way she would have been if she wasn’t free and was a slave.   She is telling racists that she doesn’t care if her confidence offends them and they are upset that she is equal to them. In the next line she tells these people that no matter what they say, how they look at her, or how hateful they are towards her she is going to rise up against it because she has confidence.

I really liked this poem and can relate to it having been made fun of my entire life (no lie, i was teased until the end of high school). She gives people the strength to rise against whatever is bringing them down.   I think is a great poem and I hope others find it as inspirational as i did.

I was going to post a halloween poem blog but I couldn’t cut and paste because word press is stupid.  So I will just talk about halloween.   I want to post something and get credit.  I ran out of poems I brought to class to talk about. 

I hope everyone had a good halloween. I did. I am bummed though because my apartment building did a trick or treat throught out the building for the kids that live there. We were the only people in our hallway that put up the trick or treaters welcome sign and we only got 2 kids.  I know way more than 2 kids live in the building.  So now we are stuck with a ton of candy. But we are having an “afterween” Party in 2 weeks, it will be eaten then.  But we went to a fun party at our friend’s apartment in the old danver’s state mental hospital.  The apartments there are really nice and really haunted.  Or so my friends that live there tell.  I’d believe it. My boyfriend’s mom is a nurse and did an intership type thing there in college.  She told us some crazy stories.

So here is where I shall talk about poetry.   I want people to post halloween poems to this blog instead of comments.  I was looking for a halloween poem and the few I found were lame. I found a short one that was funny.  I want to see if you all reading this can do any better.  So send me what you got!!

I chose for one of my poems, The Island by A.A. Milne. http://www.geocities.com/eugenewrayburn/island.html

I brought in a second poem of his for class as well but the name of it escapes me at the moment and I can’t find it online anywhere.

A.A. Milne is the author of all the Winnie the Pooh stories.  I know all the storys well but I had no idea he wrote poetry. I have the a book with his complete works in it and it also to my surprise had poetry.  I admit that since I bought the book it has only sat on my shelf and I never picked it up to look at it til the day I flipped through it deperate to find something resembling poetry for class. (the cover says it had his poetry in the book, I just had never read any of them).

I like this poem because both kids and adults can relate to it.  At the begining it sounds like a little kid talking about this trip he is gonna take and what he is going to do. It makes me think about a little child using their imagination and being silly.  As the poem continues it sounds more adult like. I love the last  8 lines the best. They remind me of my trip to Nova Scotia. It would be how I would describe it. The last two lines describe how my boyfriend and I felt at different points on our trip when we were the only people around. Actually, the picture at the top my blog is from my trip.  You can only so say the poem relates to other place people go and feel like they are the only ones in the world. 

The poem reminds me of going somewhere to escape from the rest of the world.

“I’m Not That Girl”  a song from the musical Wicked

 

Hands touch, eyes meet
Sudden silence, sudden heat
Hearts leap in a giddy whirl
He could be that boy
But I’m not that girl:

Don’t dream too far
Don’t lose sight of who you are
Don’t remember that rush of joy
He could be that boy
I’m not that girl

Ev’ry so often we long to steal
To the land of what-might-have-been
But that doesn’t soften the ache we feel
When reality sets back in

Blithe smile, lithe limb rubish
She who’s winsome, she wins him
Gold hair with a gentle curl
That’s the girl he chose
And Heaven knows
I’m not that girl:

Don’t wish, don’t start
Wishing only wounds the heart
I wasn’t born for the rose and the pearl
There’s a girl I know
He loves her so
I’m not that girl:

I chose this song a my poem because I find the lyrics to be very poetic.  Also I think everyone, male or female can relate to it.  I know that at my times I have felt that I wasn’t good enough for someone, that i wasn’t their type.  You can feel the emotion in the lyrics and its very powerful.  I like the first four lines of the song about meeting each others eyes and grazing each other in passing, and how you both are silent but you feel something between you and you get excited and think for just a moment that he/she could actually like you. But the the next four lines are the reality that you may be wishing for the impossible and that you’re not the person you want to be so you can win this boy/girl’s heart. I think the lyricist,  Stephen Schwarts, captures that situation perfectly.  Its something we’ve all experienced in one way or another and can relate to.  This is one of my favorite songs from the musical.

For my third poem I picked William Shakespear’s All the World’s a Stage.

All the world’s a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances,
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first, the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse’s arms.
Then the whining schoolboy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress’ eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon’s mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lined,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slippered pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well saved, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank, and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion,
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything.

 

I chose this poem because I have never actually read the whole thing. I have only heard the first few lines. I like how he compares scenes in a play to stages in life. I didn’t expect the poem to go in that direction. I expected more talk of people acting on stage like puppets.  I like the humor in the end when he says we end at “second childishness and mere oblivion,” only its worse.  He is saying we enter and exit the world in almost the same condition, blind, no teeth, no sense of taste, we lose all or most of senses we gain as children. Its worse because when we are old we know what its like to have these senses where as a child we were just leaning about them.

Shakespear goes in to a great detail in his discriptions of the scences in life. You can picture each thing as he talks about it. You can picture a child with a school bag not wanting to go to school walking slowly, with his head down ,looking sullen.  His details make the poem more compelling and more real.

The poem I brought in for the second poem assignment was an excerpt from Henry Wadsworth Longfellow’s poem Evangeline;

                           Half-way down to the shore Evangeline waited in silence,

Not overcome with grief, but strong in the hour of affliction —

Calmly and sadly waited, until the procession approached her,

And she beheld the face of Gabriel pale with emotion.

Tears then filled her eyes, and, eagerly running to meet him,

Clasped she his hands, and laid her head on his shoulder and whispered —

“Gabriel! be of good cheer! for if we love one another,

Nothing, in truth, can harm us, whatever mischances may happen!”

Smiling she spake these words; then suddenly paused, for her father

Saw she slowly advancing. Alas! how changed was his aspect!

Gone was the glow from his cheek, and the fire from his eye, and his footstep

Heavier seemed with the weight of the weary heart in his bosom.

But with a smile and a sigh she clasped his neck and embraced him,

Speaking words of endearment where words of comfort availed not.

Thus to the Gaspereau’s mouth moved on that mournful procession 

I chose this section because it demanstrates the themes of love and stuggle that are the basis of this poem.

The poem is about a girl from Acadie,  a settlement in Nova Scotia.  She is separated from her father and her lover when they are forced out out their homes and left on the streets of various places around the world.  Their homes are destroyed so that they won’t go back.  This is based on actual events that occured in 1755 in Acadie, Nova Scotia( it is no longer refered to as Acadie, it is many cities and towns now).  I learned about this historical event when I was in Nova Scotia this past summer on vaction. We visited many historical places including Grand Pre’ one of the spots that was part of Acadie. They have a memorial church in the place where the church was in the settlement. I had never heard of the poem. I had heard of Longfellow and decided after learning about Acadie that I wanted to read the poem and bought a beautiful hardcover illistrated copy.  This was something we never learned about in any history class I’ve taken. But it affected the United States as many of the deported people were brought here(hence Acadia National Park in Bar Harbor, Maine) and forced to rebuild their lives.  

I was fasinated by all this and would like to know if any of the families are my relatives, as I have ancestors from Canada. They had a posted list of names in one of the musuems and we found several families names that are in my boyfriend’s family tree.  So you never know who might be of Acadian decent and not evenknow it. This is one vaction I will never forget and I will defenitely be going back to Nova Scotia. It is an beautiful place to visit and I recommend it to anyone who likes to travel.   The picture that is on the top of my blogpage is from my trip to Nova  Scotia.                                                                                                                              

I brought in the poem The Road Less Traveled, by Robert Frost. http://www.davidpbrown.co.uk/poetry/robert-frost.html.  This poem has always been on of my most favorite poems. I thought that for the first poem I should bring one in that is one of my personal favorites and that means alot to me. This poem reminds me that its ok to be different. That its important to go your own way and do your own thing. This poem inspires me to make my own path through life and to learn as I go. Its hard to make one’s own way in the world sometimes and this poem is a great sourse of encouragment. The last line of the poem “I took the road less traveled by and it has made all the difference,” lets the reader know that the outcome(s) from being yourself and going your own way are good and worth extra work it my take. My denstist had a framed picture that had the last 3 or 4 lines of the poem on it. I would read the lines over and over while I sat in the chair everytime. The poem has stuck with me ever since. I enjoyed the poems that my group mates brought in. We has such a diverse selection. I had an inspirational poem, there was a love poem, a silly poem, and song lyrics from a hiphop song. Unfortunately I don’t remember the names or authors for the poems they brought.