blog 11

Reading Buffalo Bills defunct was actually really hard for me and I wasn’t even sure if that was the title or if it didn’t have a title but I did not like the poem at all. I thought the format actually hurt the poem I think a person would have to really be into poetry to understand it because I had a problem just following the poem especially around the fourth lines he starts putting a lot of his words together as if it was one word and it definitely influenced the poem for me and I felt it made the poem harder to understand. I think the poem uses some visual aspects but not a lot and I wasn’t sure if the poem was talking about something else are actually talking about the life and death of buffalo bill, it was kind of dubbing is as more of a hero that he can break a lot of pigeons necks and he was saying he rode a stallion, for me that was the visual in the aspect maybe Cummings sort of idolized him. That’s my opinion but I really didn’t like the poem. As far as the poem Easter wings it was a really good poem and I really liked the way the stanza gave a visual aspect to the poem and it actually reminded me of wings of like an angel and I think the visual aspect in this case really helped the poem out. The I really like this poem because I thought it was uplifting and that's why the stanza Is shaped like wings I think the poem talks about how in life there are going to be times we are up and in a second we can loose everything and that's what the poem reminds me of like in the first stanza the speaker talks about having everything and loosing it all the same and he speaks about being most poor and I think when he says then shall the fall further the flight in me I think he was referencing the fact that when we "fall" or bad stuff happens we should get up and keep fighting and when he mentions flying I think he speaking bout overcoming obstacles but also maybe about god as well, anything that happens in are life we can always have hope and maybe that to is the idea about the wings in the stanza because  like angels and or the idea of flying, overcoming obstacles. And I think the 2nd stanza only provides better details it sounds like he is talking about being sick an aging and growing thin and even with all these combinations and all the affliction he can still overcome and it only makes us stronger, when he repeats shall advance the flight in me.thats what I got from that and I really loved it and I can see how visual aspects can influence a poem.

blog 10

I really loved the poem “My papas waltz” by Roethke. I might have the wrong idea but the first time through the poem I got the feeling that is was more about an abusive father who drinks and waltzing being a type of dance I assumed is describing maybe that this was a common thing for the abuse to happen so it’s more like a routine. The first time around I felt like this was a poem about abuse and they are not actually dancing but the son is really being abused because in the first stanza it talks about the father having noticeable whiskey on his breathe and then “waltzing” with his son while he hung on like death. To me it just didn’t seem right; if I was a father (size of an ordinary man) so drunk I probably shouldn’t be so aggressive like doing the waltz with a small boy (my son), something that he hung on to death for, and that’s another thing the way it was described “But I hung on like death”, and I think he met he hung on REALLY tight but to me if you have to hold on that tight it just doesn’t seem like that would be fun. Then he said “such waltzing” which to me meant it wasn’t really waltzing, but it was a routine of abuse. In the 2^nd stanza, what I got from this was that the father and son were being so rough, lively, that the pans slid from the shelf and the mother was frowning, this stanza is where I kind of started to rethink what the poem was about, but I still leaned towards an abusive father. In this stanza people might say well if it was abuse why didn’t the mother help well in some situations and households the children are abused and there is nothing the mothers can do they too scared are abused , regardless if the mother is right or wrong or if you are me would choose to do it, this kind of stuff happens. Then in stanza 3 he says “the hand that held my wrist was battered on one knuckle, and every step you missed” obviously if the dad is intoxicated he’d been drinking for a minute so maybe he was in a previous fight with someone or even his wife and that’s why they said knuckle because think about it, he didn’t just batter his knuckle dancing, he didn’t say his hand or his fingers or anything else he said his knuckles, when you ball up your fist and you sock someone usually you damage your knuckles. And the fact that he used battered why couldn’t he use damaged, hurt, pain, we usually associate battered with assault like “battered woman” “battery and assault’ I don’t know that’s what I got out of that, and every step he missed I don’t think was a reference to missing steps of the dance but actually missing steps because he was drunk. In the last stanza I wasn’t too sure about the first two lines but the last lines he said ‘Then waltz me off to bed, still clinging to your shirt”, to me he is clinging on because he is scared, when I cling on to something is because I’m scared or scared to lose something but I don’t ever remember a pleasant time I just didn’t feel a happy poem, That’s how I feel about that. After I read it that was my initial response but I read it two more times and I started to get another meaning out of the poem. Maybe the dad is drunk and comes home to see his family and maybe they really are “waltzing” or playing or whatever but there doing it so rough they knock the pans off the shelf and the mom is mad that’s why she frowns. And maybe his hands were battered from work from early because he hasn’t been home that’s why the father is so excited to see his son, then his father finally goes put him to bed. I think both ways are possible and regardless it was a REALLY good poem.

blog 8

The poem Because I Could Not Stop for death by Dickerson was difficult for me to understand or I just was not into it but either way I really appreciated the poem, and it was definitely my least favorite. At first I thought the poem talked about a death and wasn’t sure what the poem meant when it uses “we” a lot and I was actually really confused. What I got from this was maybe the “we” was the idea of the speaker and death being “We”. But then why say “He kindly stop from me” speaking about death, when I think of poems and death I always feel sad and is more of a negative feeling in poems. This poem I think was about death but maybe in more of a spiritual sense and the journey of death, everybody is born and everyone has to die and we should look at death as part of a circle of life and it becomes more accepted. I think the poem was referring to the phases of life like for example in stanza two the poem talks about school, recess, and sunset the point in life when where children and innocent and talks about how centuries go by and the days feel shorter I think that this was referencing to how time goes by fast. In death we see are whole life over sort of like a circle and that’s what I got from this. Lisel Mueller “Hope” was my favorite poem and what I got from this was it was a poem about Hope and this poem is describing about how hope is in everything from the trees to the angels to earthworms, hope is in the genius that invents the future. I love this poem because I feel it is so true, Hope is important and it is in everything we do and if we didn’t have hope we wouldn’t have anything.

blog 7

I thought Fences by August Wilson is a really good dramatic play .There were a lot of different emotions I felt throughout the story. As far as Troy’s character, usually I would feel anger but I actually felt sorry for him, he was a cheater who treats his sons wrong and talks to his wife like a dog as referred to in the text in scene 4, I notice he also says a lot of provocative things talking about sex and he says it in front of people and to me it shows that he really doesn’t respect her, and the fact that he cheats on her. In the play I think Troy’s character holds A LOT of anger and pessimistic views like even in the beginning scene’s he was complaining about how there are no black drivers but yet he didn’t have a license. Or when Lyon comes to visit, Troy assumes he wants to borrow money and then makes Rose give him her allowance. Rose even tries to convince Troy to sign the papers so Cory can play sports but he blows it off and explains white people won’t ever let him get a head in sports he needs to get a job. I think he has some psychological problems within and the way he grew up himself, with an aggressive sometimes abusive father. I think baseball is a really important aspect, and the reason he is most mad obviously is because the fact that he didn’t make it in baseball, I think because of this he, kind of lost a piece of himself, actually when we heard the story which I believe was Gabe, the story about him in the military and almost getting his head blown off and that’s why he is the way he is, a little “loose” I feel that was sort of reference to Troy and the way he is, he even said he loved baseball more than his wife when they first meant, so when he stopped playing a part of him died also and I think that and besides his father beating  incident is why he repeatedly says he wasn’t scared of death. As far as the father- that was the most disrespectful thing he could of said to his father, an old man being weak son aspect I think Fences could be a play that shows the relationships and boundaries. I think because how Troy was raised it definitely influenced how he raised his sons, with Lyon he was really cold and distant, with Cory he was really aggressive the way he talked to him and explained things and he never hugged him or was soft with him but I do think however he was not trying to hurt him but in a way make sure his son didn’t end up like him, he had good intentions. Towards the end Cory and Troy’s relationship seems to be going downhill and Cory says he is “just an old man” I think this is what made the situation escalate the most and I think Cory said that because during those times a man’s kids call them Sir and other such signs as respect, I think with little importance. I believed the way it got resolved and the only way he could have is when Troy Dies.  

blog 4

The Chrysanthemums By John Steinbeck and the Cathedral by Raymond Carver were two great stories. In Steinbeck's short story he uses alot of symbolism and gets the meaning across mostly how woman felt earlier in time when they werent looked at as equals to men. I got this from the fact that even as the story starts it even describes the ranch as being "Henry Allens foothill Ranch" even though he is married. As the story goes on there is a incident where the husband is talking to two guys in suits and made a buisness deal and didnt even include his wife and I think she didnt even know about it till after the fact and she asked HIM what the  two guys were there for, she wasnt treated as equal or partner in her relationship. I also think the flowers that Elisa planted symbolized her strength and intellegence as a woman because chrysanthemums are one of the tallest growing flowers and the strongest, and in the story it even describes her scissors as powerful and the stems seem to easy and small for her energy, I think that also symbolizes her as being a strong woman. Also the clothing, her outfit she used to garden, a mans black hat, clod-hopper shoes, and a big apron, you associate all this with masculine, in turn associate it with a man meaning intellegent, strong. And independent. The meaning of these clothes on Elisa was the idea that she and all women are as capable as men. When her husband left and the guy came and talked about all the things he did like fix pans and sharpen items and stuff I think is when we got a real look at Elisa's independence, will, and power,  she got really mad and defensive when the man first pulled up and asked her about directions and she told him, but I felt that he sort of questioned her answer when he first said "it might surprise you what them beast can pull or when he said " I aint in no hurry" I just felt everything she was saying he disagreed. I also feel that Elisa is sick of being treated like an inferior just because she is a woman and I don't see it when she is interacting with her husband but when she interacts  with the traveler man. I see this in some of her reactions like when he said he sharpened knives she comment the fact her knife was already sharpened and she doesn't need his help I also think the meaning for this was  she is her own woman and can handle her own. Another symbolic meaning in the story was when she told the drifter guy how to plant and raise these chrysanthemum flowers, her whole attitude changed after that " her eyes grew alert and eager" in this moment explaining the process of taking care of the flower, the process, water it, and how to transfer it I felt that was her strength and gift and I think it was meant to represent woman as a whole like look I am smart, I can do something on my own woman can stand up tall and strong just like the flower. Good story! Another story was the Cathedral which I really  loved, I felt this story meaning focused more on human ignorance and also acceptance. The narrator in the Cathedral is the husband and I know this because he says I a lot, through this whole story I think the husband is a bastard and he treats his wife like he doesn't love he'd in my opinion, more like he just like her if that. I see this because even at the beginning he talks about her friendship with this blind man and she wrote a poem and he goes on to say "I can remember I don't think much of the poem, anyway" throughout the story he is real dismissive about anything not containing to him like when he said he was gonna take the blind man bowling and he asked if his wife was a negro because her name was Beulah and he wasn't really compassionate about the wife passing. He was just a real ignorant shallow bastard. I believe the irony in the story was that the the friend was technically blind but the husband was the one that was really "blind" to his own ignorance. Saying things like blind people don't smoke and how can he be married to someone you can't see. I believe a really crucial time in the stories meaning was the incident when the husband asked the blind man if he had a tv, and to me this represented the period of time when there was racial discrimination laws and I also knew when the husband uses the word negro that it's during a time when segregation was "right", and when the blind man answered he has two and he always turns in the colored tv and for me I think that represents change and when he speaks bout the black and white he calls it old like in old ways we need to change. I don't know what I take from the ending I think after getting to know the blind man the husband kind of realized he misjudged and he is wrong and that was him closing his eyes and when he said "it's really something" but that's what I got from that.

blog 3

In "The story of an Hour" the setting took place in the 19 century at a house I know this because back in those days when men, military men, or important people died they would print there death in the newspapers and also send telegrams to the wives just like what happen in the story, the setting also takes place in a house like when the narrator mentions mrs Mallard going to her room after finding the news that her husband died. This story somewhat confused me because as a reader  I know Mrs Mallard loves her husband, in the story it goes over and over about how she weeps for him, and after she hears about the death she cries and goes to her room all by herself and sits in a chair and stares out the window. To me the setting gave a since of pain, a usual reaction to someone greiving the loss of a loved one, by incorporating this the story becomes more sad and I also felt the story was slow paced and that to made the story seem a little more sad. What I feel about the story was that obviously Mrs Mallard loved her husband are she wouldnt have reacted the way she did but she also kind of felt a sort of freedom when she thought he was dead because in the story "she said it over and over under her breath: free free free'. However I do not think she wanted to feel that way I actually think she was sort of scared and confused that she was having this feeling of being "happy" or a since of relief that he was dead, I got this from the fact that in the story it describes something was reaching for her and she did not know what it was that she was begginning to recognize it and after repeatedly whispering free free free she was terrified and had a blank stare on her face. She didnt know how to take that feeling if it was monstrous or not to feel that way and towards the end of the story it seemed that she was more excepted of the feeling and had admitted that she would again cry for him but she was excited for the years to come and welcomed it. After awhile I think she was actually looking forward to it for example her summers and spring days she was so looking forward to. I personally think the real reason she died was because her husband had showed up and he really wasnt dead so all that free wishful thinking was gone and she probably felt trapped or depressed or however sshe felt, but the same feeling came back to her so she probably died from shock are something of the sort. Another story I really liked was the "Hills Like White Elephants" I think the setting was a good factor in setting the mood, when I thought of the setting, two people at a train station having a conversation, gave a since of loniness and confusion, like which direction are we going. The whole time reading the story I was curious and excited to learn more and more I really wanted to know what they were talking about. The crazy thing about it that even though they never said abortion right out I could feel what they were talking about, I thought to myself they are talking about abortion I have heard this conversation before, not nevering haveing had one myself, but the tone and the clues made it more then enough information to catch on to what they were talking about. I can say it was probably easier for a woman to catch on quickly because it is such a sensitive topic and discussion, just being woman you have thought about it, if your against it or not you have thought about it and have an opinion about it. This story touched me as a female and and it was even a little sad I thought because you can tell by the way the woman speaks and she really doesnt know what she wants to do and is really worried, it really piss me off when the guy keeps insisting its the right thing to do. he says stuff like its an "simple opearation" and he keeps assruring her they will be fine. It really makes me angry several times she ask if he loves her and if he would love her if she keeps it, the story was so realistic and I actually felt I knew those people and this is stuff that happens all the time the author did an amazing job. Overall the stories were all good but I ecspecially liked these two.

Jessica Blog 2

I thought all the short stories were good but "The Lottery" by Shirley Jackson and "An Occurrence at owl creek bridge" by Ambrose Bierce were two of my favorites. I was shocked by the ending of "The Lottery", Jackson really lull her readers into thinking that the story was going to be a little ordinarily happy story with a happy end, being that the story starts off describing the village and how its little and talks about how the kids are in school and playing, the adults chattering, husbands spending time with their wives the author also gives an description about the weather how it was sunny and bright in the middle of summer, a reader would have never anticipated a more horrific ending. This short story consist of Irony, for example in the Title itself; "The Lottery" you automatically assume the story is going to be about someone winning money or someone's life changing for the better, and even when Tessie was picked as the "winner" is a type of Irony because most the time when someone is picked in a raffle are drawing of some sort the "winner" is usually given something or benefits in some way, but in this story that wasn't the case. I believe in this story the point of view was in 3rd person because the narrator did not participate in any action as one of the characters, however im not sure if I think the point of view is omniscient because the narrator didn't really tell information about the characters, I felt the narrator didn't know everything about the characters, like for example the author would say "all of the children' or "The men and woman" and yeah there were some significant like Summers, Tessie, etc. but I actually did not know much about them except they live in the same village, I related to none of them more then the the other. I think Jackson made that a point and used this strategy on purpose and I think the story benefited from it because its like all of the characters are just as valuable are even as UN-valuable as one another, meaning that anybody's name could have been picked from that box, none of them were above or below it all, nobody was safe. Using this strategy the author creates suspense and doubt. The author also misleads in the the title, the first paragraph and also through the story leaving the readers flabbergasted as the story unfolds. On the other hand "An Occurrence at owl Creek Bridge" was not as much as a misleading story, I felt the story started off cold and dark and ended that way. This story was also in 3rd person but more towards limited omniscient point of view, I think this because the narrator knew a lot of information about this guy Peyton, he was a plantar and a slave owner he was married with a kid and for the most part was an OK guy, a guy you wouldn't think placed in the predicament he was facing. The author also gave really descriptive details about the hanging, how Peyton fell into the water he could feel it, he could hear the gun shots and his watch ticking which I think represented his death. This made the story more suspenseful. I love how Ambrose Bierce told the story I think it was really spiritual and sort of represents death and after life as well as one's mans love for his family when he was being hung and he thought about his family and how he wanted to see them again one last time, I think the part with him escaping and going through the forest and going back home and seeing his family like if nothing happen signifies his last unfinished business, kind of like he had to see them before he goes and he got to to him he got to see them and then at the end the bright light came and he was hanging from the tree. I think the light represents his "passing" not his death but his passing. Either way the stories were both really good and I liked both.