Nothing

Looking through the glass 

the rain pouring so slowly

 Drowning in sorrow 

…

Is tomorrow gone?

no stars no dreams nothing seen

now where do I go?

Dear friend, 

I wanted to take on a haiku and the poem I chose to imitate was from you in the Anthology of Wartime Haiku, into to poetry it goes, 

“From the window of despair 

May sky

there is always tomorrow 

…

At daybreak 

stars disappear

where do I discard my dreams?” 

Pg100-101. I wanted to encapture almost like a similar style of words for example tomorrow, stars, dreams. I wanted to get the connection between poems by presenting these words in similar tones. I know you were in a really bad place where you wished everything was over and that you could finally go home. I chose to encompass those feelings you might have felt. By choosing my first line to be “looking through the glass” almost like a reflection in your poem of its first line being “From the window of despair”. I wanted to bring forth the imagery of the poem and have a new modern audience see through the window that it is pouring rain outside as maybe you were inside writing your poem. I wanted people to see the true sorrows you may have been through being in an internment camp and the pain it caused you to try and live on. Even though you had said it was a May sky meaning it was in May at the end of Spring and beginning of Summer I wanted to bring a counterpart of myself into it. How whenever I am going through a tough time it is usually when it’s raining. The rain just symbolizes for me the dreadfulness and freedom to cry, with my cries being muffled by the rain. I hope this is alright for you and you don’t see it drift much apart from your poem. In my second stanza just like you had written “Where do I discard my dreams?” I wrote “Now where do I go?”, I wanted to say that you were the dreams and now were deciding what to do. 

I wanted to show the power of alliteration I know as a fellow friend you would love from your writing skill level. I chose to input this to symbolize the word no and nothing in stanza 2 line 2. With alliteration I could help display your work on one line instead of multiple. This helps in bringing rhythm and the importance that there is nothing surrounding this poem. There is an abyss of nothing, and it is the speaker’s choice to see where maybe they can go.

I know you like free-style haiku and from the last lines from the stanzas you would end that would be 7 syllables instead of 5 in retrospect, a traditional haiku ending and starting with 5 syllable lines and in the middle being 7 syllables. I tried to form a nice sounding rhythm to your poem to intrigue an audience to go on a poetic rhythm as they continue reading on. I wanted to fight your notion and capture the traditional haiku to show you that it also could work with your poem and what you are trying to say about being boxed in and not being able to live your life freely. From being on one side of the window and watching the world pass by as you sit and write poetry to show what had happened during World War 2. 

My dear friend people are drifting apart from history so I wanted to make this poem to pay homage to your poem. It deserves to be read and analyzed by poets throughout. I thank you for writing something so deep and emotionally beautiful. That is why I made this to show people today the dreams that were crushed, the pain and abuse you had gone through, and most importantly the historical aspect of when you wrote this. Today, there is something similar as to when you were in the camps. It is a war. A war on Gaza and the Palestine people. How they now have to leave their homes just like you did or they would face death. Even today they are still facing it and don’t know whether they can get it tomorrow. My dear friend this is why I wrote this homage poem, to have these people who are oppressed know they are not alone and that we the people see them. Like how we saw you guys we will not remain silent. 

          With deep love and understanding your friend,

    Kelly Flores

Look Around Sonora County

Driving through white snow,

As snowflakes flew gracefully,

Through the coast redwoods.

…

Summer heat has died,

Black, eight-legged Critters emerge,

As Autumn awakes.

…

Sunset Fully Sets,

As night creeps in, an owl hoots,

Calling predators.

…

Rich with history,

A California Ghost Town,

In grassy foothills.

…

Beyond the small towns,

There is a whole new world,

Of nature’s wonders.

Review: Instead of creating one haiku, I created an anthology based on observations and real-life experiences I had exploring Sonora County. These selected pieces were inspired by the multiple haikus Japanese Americans wrote during their stay at the Japanese internment camps. They mostly utilized poetic elements like imagery and nature to describe their personal situations and observations. I followed an identical approach to write my haikus.

Unlike, their haikus though, in which the majority were free verse in English, I decided to follow the traditional format which is 5 syllables for the first and last line and 7 syllables for the middle because I thought it was simpler. Though experiences are different between the poets and me, the use of imagery, setting, and nature is highly implemented on both sides. For example “white snow” (Poem 1, line 1), “Snowflakes flew”(Poem 1, line 2), “Summer heat” (Poem 2, line 1), “autumn”(Poem 2,3), “sunset fully sets” (Poem 3, Line 1), “Nights creeps in” (Poem 3, Line, “Small towns” (Poem 5, line 1), “grassy foothills” (Poem 4, line 3). Similar descriptions and details were given to describe seasons, weather, and surroundings in the Anthology of Wartime Haiku. Like in Kyotaro Komur’s “Lingering summer heat, Japanese proceeding under guard, on dusty white road.” (Komur, Pg 109) and Shiho Okamoto’s “Iron Fence immovable, over the mountain, winter sunrise.” (Okamoto, Pg 112). What makes my anthology connect with the Anthology of Wartime Haikus is both take place in the state of California. Also, the places I described are historical landmarks, meaning just like the Japanese internment camps, these “small towns” hold their own history. For example, “Rich with history, A California Ghost Town, In grassy foothills.” (poem 4) Up in Sonora there are various towns like Columbia, Twain Harte, Mariposa, Jamestown, etc. One of these towns is the Chinese Camp which is practically a ghost town. What’s its history? According to the California Office of Historic Preservation, the Chinese camp was the headquarters for stage lines in the early 1850s and for various CA Chinese mining companies. This was during the gold rush. This is why I added, “Rich with history” to hint at the gold rush. The other small towns were part of the gold rush too. It was a small input but, it holds great significance to California’s history, just like the Japanese internment camps.

Japanese American poets described major features that highlighted back towards Japanese internment camps like Yotenchi Agari’s haiku, “Moonlit summer sky/ same black houses/ standing in rows,” (Agari, Pg 111). I was going to familiar structure for my haikus. Like Agari, I highlighted significant features my main idea was known for like, “Driving through white snow, As snowflakes flew gracefully, Through the coast redwoods.”  (Poem 1). During the winter season, it is likely to snow up in Sonora. One of the most significant attributes of Sonora is the coast redwood trees. Readers may not pick up that I’m talking about specifically Sonora because snow and coast redwoods aren’t just located in that area, however from relying on vivid imagery I am attempting to create an image in their head of what I saw when I was there.

 This is the same with American Japanese poets, they created a visual of their experience, even if the readers had little knowledge about the internment camps, with the use of imagery, readers managed to see and imagine what these poets lived through at the time. I wanted to recreate that feeling for my readers. I could have been more direct in naming the small towns, but I also wanted my readers to build their own visual picture of what I was referring to. I believed that if I mentioned names like “Mariposa” or “Twain Harte”, most readers would easily get the idea and automatically imagine the exact town, pushing away the visual context I provided in my poem. In other words, I wanted head gears to turn. I wanted my readers to think, not just to quickly come up with the answers like “Oh it’s Twain Harte”. I was seeking to write something simple but not too straightforward. Something similar to Yotenchi Agari’s second haiku on page 111. The poem was centered on the Stockton Assembly Center, however Agari didn’t mention the name directly in the poem but indicated it with imagery. I was inspired to follow a similar poem structure because I wanted to ensure readers saw what my haikus described, but also not make it too obvious.

Aside from the first haiku what about the rest? “Summer heat has died, Black, eight-legged Critters emerge, As Autumn awakes.” (Poem 2). This haiku was quite specific in the aspect that I mentioned seasons and black, eight-legged critters. The reason why I added “eight-legged”, was because in Mariposa there is a time when spiders appear, instead of saying spiders though I wanted my readers to envision what I meant and what specific creature I was talking about. I am not talking about just any spider; I was referring to a black tarantula. Why a tarantula? Driving to Mariposa I came across tarantulas crawling on the floor and across the streets and I thought it was one of the most memorable moments I had traveling to Sonora because I had never seen it before. Down here in Merced, it’s unlikely you see a spider casually cross the road, especially a black tarantula. So not only did I rely on identical literary techniques that Japanese-American poets used to describe their situations in the Japanese internment camps, but I also included distinctive moments I had. Though they were quite the opposite compared to the experiences internees had during their stay at internment camps, the haikus were based on experiences that were considered one of the most striking or persistent in one’s mind whether it was good or bad.

What about the use of season and time? With the seasons mentioned, readers get the idea that I have visited Sonora multiple times throughout the year, whether it was winter, summer, or autumn. I purposefully made that clear because I believe if I didn’t my haikus would be incomplete because the reason I went to Sonora was due to the time of season. I also included how I observed beyond the little towns in my 3^rd and 5^th poems.

 I added, “Sunset Fully Sets, As night creeps in, an owl hoots, Calling predators.” (Poem 3). During the night, in Sonora, it’s likely predators like wolves and coyotes show up. What’s interesting is they start to appear right when the sun begins to set, it happens fast. This was something that I observed. I wasn’t specific with what type of predators; however, this allows readers to come up with their own guesses and work their imagination. The fifth poem was quite broad in the aspect that when I said “small towns” it can be taken to context that it can be any small town. However, putting my title as “Look around Sonora County” gives an indication that it’s a town in Sonora. I didn’t want my readers to overthink my poems either, so that’s why I made sure to make my title specific. This is what I noticed the internees did, even when their haikus had no titles, they relied on imagery to stay specific on their main idea.  

Overall, my main focus was to have readers make up a realistic image through their minds by only depending on the imagery and multiple adjectives I provided. I created my anthology relying on the poetic elements Japanese American haiku poets used in their collection of poems. I also included historical context and explained how my observations not only were important to me but also how these observations held a great significance and impact on California’s history itself, just like the Japanese Internment camps did to these Japanese American Haiku poets.

Claudia Dominguez

Citations: Parks, California State. “California State Parks.” CA State Parks, ohp.parks.ca.gov/ListedResources/Detail/423#:~:text=Reportedly%20founded%20about%201849%20by,several%20California%20Chinese%20mining%20companies. Accessed 2 May 2024. 

My Letter to You

The poem that I have selected in writing an imitation of was called “Song” by Edmund Waller. At first, I had difficulty in finding exactly what poem I wanted to imitate as my own creation. I looked through many of the poems we had gone through since the beginning of the semester up till this following day, but I knew I wanted to write a love poem. So I remember this poem after searching and thought this would be a really great use of what today’s world may be interpreted with the importance of acknowledgment, fearlessness, and acceptance. 

For this poem, I wanted to follow the same areas of which the rhyming was taking place and the structure from Walter’s, but right at the beginning of my poem, I decided to indent a full line to make it look like this is a letter written to a loved one by including “My dearest rose”. There were debates whether I should have included “Dear rose” but it wouldn’t really make much sense; it would sound as if this letter/poem is referring to someone named Rose. On the second line of my first paragraph, you can see that I had entered a large pause or silence, “It’s been long since I’ve last seen you…” Not only that, but I added another indented line to emphasize how much time had passed since the reader had not seen their beloved one. The pause gives it a more in depth, saddened tone as my first paragraph demonstrates remembrance for the lover; the snow reflects the purity of their love and longing of not being able to see or be without their lover. In today’s world it can be challenging to want to be with someone so badly but many don’t want to take that risk, so all there is left are the memories. Aside from this, this poem was similar to a Shakespearean Sonnet since it followed many of the rhyming schemes, since there needs to be 4 lines in each quatrain but for this poem, there are 5 lines. However, it does include a couplet on the very last line (20) but so does the three other paragraphs in my poem, including Walter’s. In addition, since traditionally a sonnet needs 18 lines with three other quatrains, it breaks the traditional standards which brings me back to my second paragraph of the poem. Originally, Walter’s poem describes his lover as someone who turns away from their own beauty but doesn’t point it out as strongly, and because this poem was written as a letter to a lover, I decided to make it an obvious factor. I used describing words such as ruby, red, and beauty to indicate how beautiful their lover is regardless of how they view themselves as. With that being said, traditionally a rose is known for its loving symbol but it also shares its side of which it may unseemingly know its worth.

This leads me to my third paragraph of my poem that begins to search for the value of their lover. Unfortunately, there are many today who do not acknowledge their own worth or believe they’re not as beautiful as they may think. This part of my poem really brings the understanding of accepting your beauty while also sharing how those who shy away from opportunities can miss out. In Walter’s poem he mentioned “Small is the worth” (11) and “Suffer herself to be desired” (14) which indicated to me that his lover’s worth was completely demolished by her own; she suffers which leads her to closing up, just like in my poem I included “The worth I seek remains in a single bud” (15-6). Even if your lover can’t accept any compliments given, they can shy away or even be embarrassed from how much praise is shown. In Walter’s poem he didn’t really mention how he felt about his lover, so I included that in the third paragraph “Don’t hide what makes me weak”. I decided to show a connection between the reader and their lover to get the sense of emotion that hiding all that makes you who you are, will only want to be near them more. As for the last paragraph in the original poem, Walter’s choice of words were so surprising to me that I had to change the words to my poem. His last paragraph reads “Then die! that she, the common fate of all things rare, may lead in thee, how small a part of time they share, that are so wondrous sweet and fair!” When I first read the beginning of that line, it felt like a jump scare at first. How can you just tell someone you love to die? So of course I had to make a change that hopefully didn’t sound harsh, “Then all should perish! if beautiful, cannot be compared to you, all is wilted and sorrowful! May all things stunning be the last thing I knew, only then life had become less sweet and true!” As you can see, I created it to be less abrupt and referred to it as having an angered tone to get the sense of feeling that your lover is what holds the meaning of beauty, so if all things that were beautiful vanished, then that would mean their lover and the rose wouldn’t exist either. In addition, an extra exclamation mark was added onto my imitation of the poem to understand the frustration the reader has to want for their lover to acknowledge themselves positively. In other words, to accept how you look is what makes a part of something large, you can’t shy away but embrace your value and beauty, no matter how many times you doubt it. 

Celeste Tejeda-Menera

Interpretation of Beauty Ideals

William Shakespeare is a poet who when thought about we think of love and undying passion. His sonnet “My mistress eyes are nothing like the sun”, follows the proper format with three quadrants and ends with a rhyming couplet. The tone of his sonnet compared to his other poems has a tone of irony, the opposite of the eternal love poems that we are used to him writing. Dominant themes in this sonnet include a male speaker expressing their love/lust for a woman. Quite seemingly objectifying her physically and spiritually. However, when reading the last two lines of the poem, “And yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare as any she belied with false compare” (lines 13-14) I realized that the poem doesn’t talk about objectifying a woman. Rather the topic is that women shouldn’t fall under beauty ideals.

Now answering the question if the meaning of Shakespeare’s sonnet was transformed or enhanced by Catherine Tate’s classroom performance. I believe that it was transformed because at first, the poem seems to be calling the speaker’s mistress plain, “I have seen roses damasked, red and white, but no such roses see I in her cheeks” (lines 5-6). Especially since the speaker is a man, that detail further reasons that he is simply comparing women to beautiful symbols and placing her beneath them. Yet when Catherine read the sonnet with an angry and loud passion, the sonnet for me was transformed. That loud passion and fast rapid pace gave it an uplifting tone as if she rejected those comparisons and beauty ideals. I felt it more empowering for women when she read those metaphorical lines with a disregard for them. Since already in the video she seemed to not care for Shakespear, she chose the perfect sonnet to prove that she disregards what he tries to portray.

The sonnet written by Shakespeare and Catherine’s interpretation has one overall similarity that makes either way read correctly. The similarity is that they both reject the beauty ideals that women “have” to fall in. Through Shakespeare’s last rhyming couplet, we as readers understand that his love wasn’t rare, it was simply real because he didn’t care that his mistress didn’t look perfect rather to him she already was. For him, this sonnet would’ve been read in a slow pace and softer tone just as the rest of his poems. However, Catherine read the sonnet with confidence and pride as if the comparison she read were beneath her and all women, ultimately rejecting beauty ideals.

~Jeshua Rocha

Beyond the Poetic

Catherine Tate’s recitation of Shakespeare’s sonnet 130, “my mistress’ eyes are nothing like the sun,” transforms its meaning by breaking the sonnet’s conventional form through a chaotic gender performance that opposes masculine order. The traditional situation of a sonnet involves a male speaker expressing his idealized love through poetic elements, but Shakespeare’s sonnet opposes this as the speaker refers to his “mistress” as lacking the emphasized beauty found in nature – “coral is far more red… no such roses see I in her cheeks” (Shakespeare 2, 6). The speaker brings realism by portraying how his love is incomparable to the romanticism that poetry tends to display, referring to them as a “false compare” in which the speaker provides his “mistress” with her own individuality (14). This is furthered from the volta in line 13 where the speaker shifts from presenting his love as potentially ugly, but then unveiling that true love to him is the beauty beyond the poetic metaphors or similes; it is her genuine self.

Cacophony also follows throughout the sonnet up to the 12th line, until the volta holds a change in sound and becomes euphonic, “and yet, by heaven, I think my love as rare…” (13). Cacophony mimics the chaos prevalent throughout the ugliness of the twelve lines, preceding how the unpleasant sounds reflects the unpleasantness of how the speaker’s love is incomparable to anything beautiful. However, euphony ends the sonnet because it is through the identity beyond the poetic that is pleasant and beautiful.

Straightforwardly, this is a sonnet chaotically presenting itself through its ugliness by not providing the desired aestheticism expected by popular conventions. The sonnet’s chaotic imperfection orders its existence through its 14 lined, iambic pentameter that defines the identity of the sonnet/mistress. 

Catherine Tate’s gender performance is an expression of her character’s identity by embodying the chaotic mannerisms to rebel against her teacher played by David Tennant. Tate’s character opposes the order in which her teacher tries to enforce, but during her recitation does it show that the character is intelligent, despite the supposed belief that she was “dull.” Instead of a male speaker speaking in the voice of a woman, it is a female speaker. It is her femininity that creates the order of her identity, in which her chaotic manners structures who she is. She recites the sonnet in continuation without any pauses, embodying the chaos that she poses against her teacher. Thus, her “ugliness” – in terms of her personality as being perceived reprehensible by her teacher – is a definitive expression of Tate’s character reflected from the sonnet that defies conventions. 

-Phillip Gallo

A Rose’s Battle

I believe the most effective poem in challenging the traditional symbol of the rose was “Sea Rose,” by H.D. On the first line, “Rose, harsh rose” was being portrayed for something cruel. A rose is typically a symbol of beauty and love, but this rose is considered displeasing. On lines two through four, it states “marred and with stint of petals, meagre flower, thin, sparse of leaf.” These lines were really focused on the rose’s appearance due to its misfigured and unappealing look which goes against what a traditional rose usually stands for its breathtaking beauty. In other words, this rose is ugly, it has little amount of petals, it is very thin, all in which imagery is present in this stanza and the whole poem. This rose in particular may be referring to a woman, despite her lack of beauty, she is unique.

Although this “rose” is described poorly, on lines five and six it states, “more precious than a wet rose.” A rose that is wet has a bright and a glitter appearance, it could be referring to a blossoming rose. So a rose that is misfigured has a higher value than a rose in blossom. It may also refer to the sea since the water reflects and glitters from bright sources such as the sun and moon. In addition, on line eight states, “you are caught in the drift” which is portraying the sea as rough, but the rose is staying firm in the drift. That being said, traditionally the rose is seen as delicate but this rose is strong and independent in the drifting sea.

Which appoints my next lines of reasoning, nine through thirteen continue to describe the environment of the sea but with the wind being rough. On lines nine and ten it states, “Stunted, with small leaf, you are flung on the sand” in which the rose or woman is tossed by the many brutal battles of the world. Even though the rose is put through a harsh environment, the rose is “lifted in the crisp sand that drives in the wind,” according to lines eleven through thirteen. In other words, through the hardships of life being thrown to this rose, it continues to stay put but also sounds like the rose is flying across the breeze, as though to say the woman wants to be free from all that life is pushing onto her. Traditionally, a rose is meant to be kept with care but this rose is kept in harsh environments that can harm it.

Furthermore, on lines fourteen through fifteen, “Can the spice-rose drip such acrid fragrance hardened in a leaf?” This is the only line that had a question mark instead of a period because it is asking of its questionable and strong fragrance. The spice-rose can be interpreted as saying that the strong fragrance is the brutal environment in the woman’s life. In addition, the poet somewhat makes it seem as though a spice-rose and a rose are to be compared. Basically to portray that the rose may look like it is losing its strength but, it is able to create its own fragrance. A rose typically has a beautiful smell but this rose is overpoweringly displeasing.

With that being said, I don’t believe Adrianna Puente really challenged the traditional symbol of the rose because it didn’t seem like it was well captured. In a sense that the rose isn’t only taking part but a poppy as well, which really drives away from the idea of a traditional rose. In addition to this, I thought the rose wasn’t really part of this poem, it mostly was speaking of the orchards, tangerines, and “Electric orange.” However, this poem did contain lots of imagery and diction. The formatting was really interesting on how “I am” was used as a repetition on the first and second paragraph, to indicate that this is what they are resembling or not.

Celeste Tejeda-Menera

Picture of a Rose

After reading H.D.’s “Sea Rose” and Adrianna Puente’s “The Rose and The Poppy”, I believe the former is most effective in challenging the traditional symbol of the rose. The rose is often used to symbolize love, and romance. It is also known for its delicate and beautiful nature. In H.D. ‘s poem “Sea Rose”, the rose is longer a delicate or beautiful thing. It is harsh, “marred and with stint of petals”. Here, the speaker is challenging the very beauty the rose is supposed to possess and represent. It is no longer a soft, delicate flower, but a harsh one. It is no longer beautiful but disfigured with a stint or an inadequate supply of petals. The picture of a rose, a symbol of great beauty, is now being tarnished. H.D. goes on to describe the rose as a meagre flower, “thin, sparse of leaf”. Again, the rose’s beauty is being challenged. It is inadequate and because it does not have enough petals, it is thin, and without its usual fullness. It is its fullness that adds to its beauty. In the second to the last stanza, the flower is “lifted in the crisp sand that drives in the wind”. The use of the words wind and the sand, insinuates the rose is drifting along the shoreline of some beach. Hence it being a sea rose. There is great beauty to be found in this stanza. The short lines mimic the eb and flow of the waves as it crashes onto the shore. It also mimics the ease with which the wind carries the flower. The beauty of the stanza, contrast to the lack of beauty from the rose. A question is raised here. What might be the purpose of placing a rose at the sea? It is as unusual as the rose. Yet, the stanza is beautiful, and it wouldn’t be without the presence of the rose.  H.D. challenged the rose as a symbol of beauty and presented it in a different light. It has lost all its traits that make it ‘beautiful’. It is hash, and thin. But its presence on the beach suggests that there is still beauty to be found in the unusual. In the other. In the things that are not commonly viewed as beautiful. In Adrianna Puente’s poem, “The Rose and The Poppy”, the traditional symbol of the rose is not challenged. Instead it is reinforced as a way for the speaker to contrast it to the poppy. The speaker describes the rose as ravishing, pure. As a “symbol of romance…a beautiful rouge” (Puente). In the next stanza, the speaker talks of the poppy, which is an “electric orange like tangerines in an orchard of trees”. This poppy, they say, is hardly chosen to be given to lovers on Valentine’s Day. Again, the rose is not being challenged as a symbol for love, romance, and beauty. It is these very traits that the speaker exploits to reveal the unseen beauty of the poppy. For this reason, H.D. ‘s poem is more effective in challenging the traditional symbol of the rose. He took its pretty image and flipped it right on its head.

Bella Cortez

Flowers and Individuality

When examining both H.D.’s “Sea Rose” and Adrianna Puente’s “The Rose and The Poppy,” I believe H.D.’s poem is more effective in challenging the traditional symbol of the rose. What I enjoy about both poems is that, from the opening lines, they immediately draw back from the traditional symbol of the rose. The speaker in “Sea Rose” begins the poem by saying, “rose, harsh rose, marred and with a stint of petals, meagre flower, thin, sparse of the leaf” (Lines 1-4). Within these lines is an intense imagery of a rose, but not the healthy, vibrant roses that we imagine one would give to someone they love. This is a disfigured rose that doesn’t look aesthetically pleasing. It’s thin and barely has leaves, which gives the idea that the rose could be dying. However, the speaker does not diminish the disfigured flower but goes on to uplift the rose when the speaker writes, “more precious than a wet rose single on a stem-” (lines 5-7). This challenges the traditional symbol of the rose because the speaker praises the imperfections of the rose and considers it to be more beautiful than a regular healthy red rose often associated with beauty and love. What adds to the disfigured rose’s value is that despite facing adversity from its own environment, being in a place that is “flinging” and “lifting” it, the rose still survives. So, this rose symbolizes triumph instead of being a symbol of love and passion. 

I believe Puente’s poem “The Rose and The Poppy” also strays away from the traditional symbol of the rose. The speaker does the opposite of H.D.; instead of describing a non-traditional rose, the speaker replaces the idea of the rose with a poppy. The speaker also uses figurative language to solidify the idea that poppies are just as important as roses. One line says, “Electric orange like tangerines in an orchard of trees” (Lines 13-14). This line emphasizes the speaker’s main idea of embracing individuality by being a poppy instead of a traditional rose. However, I liked H.D.’s method a tad more because I liked the imagery of a disfigured rose that faces adversity and perseveres despite it and that’s what makes it better than a normal rose.

Janayah Applon

Conflicting Between Religion or Desires

The poem that I chose to read and analyze is “Ode 44” by Hafez. This poem has a lot of romance/lust involved, but at the end of the poem you will see the regret and pain the speaker experiences for committing a sin: “How have you ravished this poor penitent,” (line 27). Some may see the relationship between the two people as love, but in my opinion it was pure lust. The speaker was very conflicted between choosing to follow his religion or follow his desires.

The speaker is religious by mentioning the “verses” in line 3: “…verses on her lips.” This line is considered as a metonymy because “verses” are short lines in the bible, but also the writing is arranged in a way that has rhythm. Considering this poem, the speaker was stating how not only they are religious, but the words that come from the woman’s lips flow enough to catch his attention. The speaker mentioned how her eyes are like the eyes of Narcissus: “Narcissus-eyes all shining for the fray,” (line 4) which is a metaphor. Narcissus is a figure from Greek mythology. He was known to be so handsome that he fell in love with his own reflection, which connected back to how the speaker is describing her beauty. He says how her beauty is immaculate, and she is too good for the “fray.” 

The speaker was so attentive to her beauty that he was so ready to break the promises he made, which were to give him “the special privilege of heaven,” (line 20). He even did feel guilty for going against his religion, but he was trying to convince himself why you shouldn’t reject the woman: “Who refused wine poured out by such a girl,” (line 15). Right after he stated that, he came to the realization of the sins he made for drinking and making love with the woman. In lines 22-24, the speaker is speaking to himself trying to convince himself that he is not alone and that there are many more men that broke these promises right after declaring them. Also, how they can’t keep these promises since he considers them to be hard. He caved into the woman’s beauty that he easily broke the promises. Lines 22-26 are a metonymy because he is stating how keeping these promises are difficult when he can’t resist the woman’s beauty.

I think the love in this poem is represented as a rejection of Islamic spirituality because the speaker started off with caving into the woman’s beauty and breaking the promises he made for heaven, then realizing his mistakes and asking for forgiveness, but he starts to convince himself that keeping such promises are impossible since the beauty and looks of the woman are so intoxicating that it makes him desire her. He comes to the conclusion stating how he wants the feeling of the pain and guilt of committing this sin to be “ravished” because when he wants her. 

Gurranvir Kaur

The Body is Unique

In the poem, “We are All Whitman Song of/to/My/Your/Self” by Luis Alberto Ambroggio, didn’t sound like it had a rhythm in the poem, just like Walt Whitman’s poem, “I Sing the Body Electric.” Both these poems didn’t have a rhythm within the poems but both are described differently among people and the body. For instance in the poem by Ambroggio, he is describing all these races “With all the colors that stir up their race, Roman, Celtic, Hebrew, Moor, Hispanic, Aborigine, with kingdoms of multitudes fresh in the tree of life” in which all races are what brings the beauty of the many aspects of culture. On the other hand, Walt Whitman’s poem “I Sing the Body Electric” is referring to a large list of the body parts of female and male, to describe their difference in beauty. An example would be “Leg-fibers, knee, knee-pan, upper-leg, under-leg. Ankles, instep, foot-ball, toes, toe-joints, the heel; All attitudes, all the shapeliness, all the belongings of my or your body or of any one’s body, male or female” (Whitman 17). With this being said, I believe it interprets the male and female body as being almost one, as if their differences have contributed to their own unique beauty.

In the second video, Luis Alberto Ambroggio was asked how he felt based on Walt Whitman, the emotions he was going through in that poem. He interprets his poetic translation towards a rhythmic enumeration of body parts based on the poem, “I Sing the Body Electric” by Walt Whitman. Ambroggio’s translation of Whitman’s poem was really a softer, than a rapid stance than we might have interpreted. Ambroggio’s interpretation of the poem gave him the sense of transformation in really understanding and having a connection with the poem. In Walt Whitman’s poem, there was no need to skim through it because it didn’t follow with a meter. Although his poem didn’t occur to have a meter, the poem did have a rhythm that seemed to be and sound as a pounding of a heartbeat. As I go through the poem, it is almost impossible to stop nor pause because of the amount of run on sentences. To say the poem out loud without hardly a pause has our hearts in a rapid pace, just as our body is trying to find its rhythm, its normal pace, once more. That being said, both poems are in a sense describing the diversity between races, cultures, and gender as beautiful from the many perspectives of difference.

Celeste Tejeda-Menera