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The Profound Connection of Love and Poetry

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There’s a million poems and poets out there. Additionally, there are an infinite number of themes. In this way, poetry and love are forever intertwined. Love is hard to describe, and poetry always finds the words–maybe it’s the exceptional person wielding the pen who makes it look so easy and not the form after all. Yet the question remains as to why poetry seems to be in league with love. There are a couple of poets whose unique looks create an understanding between the two topics: Carl Sandburg, and Emily Bronte.

Viewing the world through Sandburg and Bronte

Poetry and love with Carl Sandburg

Poetry can invoke a very romantic language, as poetry fits so perfectly for pining after somebody. Additionally, just observing the folly of love or the “give and take” of romance can so perfectly obfuscate meaning in an interesting way. Take for instance, Carl Sandburg‘s poem “Offering and Rebuffing,” which so delicately plays with love and feelings toward love.

Sandburg writes: “I could love you/as dry roots love rain,” Sandburg writes. “I could hold you/as branches in the wind/brandish petals./Forgive me for speaking so soon … Love is a fool star” (Sandburg). There’s some cynicism there, which is probably warranted when it comes to love. Cynicism and love are also a perfect pair for the lovelorn. Though, not all poems are so cynical and many actually give us keen insight into how relationships operate on some level.

Poetry and love with Emily Bronte

For instance, Emily Bronte’s “Love and Friendship” invokes the duality of marriage and love when we get our most sour. “Love is like the wild rose-briar,/Friendship like the holly-tree–/The holly is dark when the rose-briar blooms/But which will bloom most constantly?” Bronte’s poem reminds the reader that marriage is a partnership between two friends even if love can seemingly fizzle out sometimes. Only through poetry can we really see this complexity of love in a different way.

Conclusion

Readers must thank the elucidating powers of poetry because poems have a way of conveying the most difficult feelings. Love is certainly one of those difficult feelings, but poetry adeptly explains the mystery of sparks igniting in our brains. So, whether the holly is dark or the roots dry, sometimes it’s just nice to have an explanation to the most complicated things in life … if only to make our feelings just a bit more clear.

Analysis, Blog

“November” by Sara Teasdale Analysis

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In November, the frost wakes us up in the morning, and we can smell the winter on its way. Yet, autumn is still there in the ground. The leaves, red and gold, lay covered in what will soon be snow. November may be a strange moth of transition, but many authors have tried to capture its wonder. With that said, Sara Teasdale’s poem, “November” perfectly encapsulates the month and captures the spirit rightly. This “November” by Sara Teasdale analysis discusses Novembers cold and kindness.

Summary

In this poem, Teasdale comforts a lost love by comparing it to the dying year. She tells us in the first two lines. She writes: “The world is tired, the year is old, / The fading leaves are glad to die.” The use of “tired” and “glad” here do not necessarily ring menacing, but rather undercuts the overall theme of comfort. That is to say, the season is happy to move on.

However, with transition in life comes the harsh reality that moving ahead can be painful. She writes in the final two lines of stanza one: “The wind goes shivering with cold / Where the brown reeds are dry.” This is evocative, as in “shivering with cold” we can see the season itself rubbing its arms together for warmth.

Toward the end of the second stanza, Teasdale reveals the truer nature of the poem. She states that, “Our love is dying like the grass, / And we who kissed grow coldly kind, / Half glad to see our old love pass / Like leaves along the wind.” That is to say, the love that has passed between two people, like seasons, can pass into coldness. Yet, inside of that love is a dormant kindness. It is a love that has distance but there is remembrance. Moreover, the ones we “kissed grow coldly kind” implies something deeper. Love is gone, but kindness remains in a state of “half glad” remembrance.

Conclusion

Teasdale poem gives us a good sense that autumn is alive in November, but it’s on its way out. Meanwhile, the weather, though cold and growing colder, has a memory of kindness and more autumnal days. In the end, Teasdale links November to love and cold kisses. She grants the reader a sense that love of the summer/fall is gone, but that people have a reverence for its passing. This “November” by Sara Teasdale analysis explains how November guides us to winter. Yet, its lasting imprint fuels our love and creativity.

Analysis, Blog

An Analysis of “The Selfish Giant” by Oscar Wilde: Magical Allegory

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Magic is a wonderful element in fiction. It appears from wizards’ hands and from the Emerald City itself. There are also a great deal of regrettable actions in fiction, that lead characters to sin and vice. Yet, sometimes magic appears in tales of woe and regret. In “The Selfish Giant,” by Oscar Wilde, a magical garden takes center stage, as well as religious allegory and sorrow.

Summary of “The Selfish Giant”

The Angry Giant

Wilde’s “The Selfish Giant” tells the story of a giant who runs a beautiful garden. The beauty of this garden is truly magical indeed, and it has caught the attention of some local children. As rambunctious youths, they want to spend their days playing among the beautiful flowers.

Wilde writes that, “It was a large lovely garden, with soft green grass,” and “there over the grass stood beautiful flowers like stars, and there were twelve peach-trees that in the spring-time broke out into delicate blossoms of pink and pearl, and in the autumn bore rich fruit.” These pleasantries are enticing to children as it gives them a place to run and play. A place to be free.

The giant, an unhappy lout, catches the children playing reproaches them, sending them from his glorious garden. Driven off, the children find that they have few places to play and yearn to return to the garden. The giant, meanwhile, places a sign board up telling the children to “keep out!” The seasons take note of the giant’s actions. As punishment for this, the seasons decide not to change in the garden, and the birds do not sing either. A flower even pokes its head out, “but when it saw the notice-board it was so sorry for the children that it slipped back into the ground again, and went off to sleep” (Wilde). The seasons, meanwhile, had a field day.

Wilde writes: “The Snow covered up the grass with her great white cloak, and the Frost painted all the trees silver. Then they invited the North Wind to stay with them, and he came. He was wrapped in furs, and he roared all day about the garden, and blew the chimney-pots down.”

A Changing Heart

After a long time alone and without the spring, the giant wakes one morning and hears singing coming from the garden. He investigates and finds children in the playing. Overjoyed at their return, he then sees a small boy—much too small—trying to climb into the trees like the rest. This “melted” the giant’s heart and he went to help the child, which he does by setting him in the tree like the rest. With this action, the giant gave the garden to the children, having admitted to being selfish, and knocked down the wall he created to keep them out.

At the end of his life, the giant sees the little boy once more. However, now the boy tells him that he has come to take him to “Paradise” as the giant had shared his garden with the children.

Analysis of “The Selfish Giant”

This story is about magic in multiple ways—mostly love and redemption. The love of the giant proved a magical resource. Even though he was selfish, he was able to see through his own cruelty. He eventually becomes a decent person to the children (and steward of the garden). Additionally, through his redemption, the giant became selfless and caring, which benefitted more than himself.

Furthermore, we have religious allegory in this story, which often appears in fantasy fiction. The garden in which the children play is similar to Eden. The giant eventually shares this garden, and through magical/religious means, he is rewarded with paradise. This is afforded to him through the Christ-like child who takes him there.

At the end of the story, Wilde tells us that, “when the children ran in (the garden) that afternoon, they found the Giant lying dead under the tree, all covered with white blossoms.” White blossoms, while beautiful, also symbolize purity and innocence. Both of these characteristics the giant has regained through charitable spirit.

Conclusion

In “The Selfish Giant” by Oscar Wilde, the author tells tale of love, regret, and a changing heart. In a way, it’s Dickensian in scope. The scowling old miser learns his lesson, after all. By looking at this text and understanding both its religious allegory and allusions, the reader makes better sense of a world fraught with the haves and the have nots. Open your heart, the story tells us, and Paradise is yours.