Richard Cory by Brooke 1020

Richard Cory is a poem written by Edwin Arlington Robinson.  I was flipping through my poetry book and decided to read this poem.  I liked it because the ending was unexpected.  I believe it was talking about a rich man that everyone would have loved to be like but this rich man killed himself.  The poem kind of lets you conclude how you feel about it by saying..."And Richard Cory, one calm summer night, went home and put a bullet through his head."  The ending was so abrupt compared to the rest of the poem.  It kind of gives me the idea that people envy others or notice others but people are people.  This rich envied man that everyone looked forward to seeing every day killed himself.  What a waste.

First Snow by Brooke 1020

The Snow is a poem written by Mary Oliver.  The title of the poem caught my eye because I love snowfall and decided it was a poem that I could relate to.  In reading the poem, I felt like it sped up and slowed down in certain sentences.  What makes this poem flow just amazes me.  I especially like line 14 and 15, The silence is immense...  She is talking about the end of the day when the snowfall has stopped.  I also love the immense silence that a fresh snow gives after dark.  She goes on further to describe the trees and the stars at night.  I appreciate this poem because I appreciate the beauty of snow.

Poetry by Brooke

Poetry is something that is very dynamic.  I think poetry was invented because people were running out of ways to speak creatively.  I'm only joking!  Yet, to hear the different forms of poetry that I have heard thus far makes it hard to give a definition to this subject.  I especially enjoy poetry when it is spoken to me.  Reading poetry is great, but I prefer having it read to me because it sounds more passionate.  I'm never going to be one that buys a book of poems by my favorite author, but I would go to a show that had different artists performing their artistic style of poetry.
Poetry to me is just an art form.  It's expression of some sort of feeling or idea translated by an authors personality.  It can create various forms of translations and responses depending on the person reading it or hearing it.  For some, I believe poetry is an important form of expression of self.

Ars Poetica by Brooke1020

Ars Poetica is a poem written by Archibald MacLeish, and it is poem written about why a poem shouldn't necessarily have a meaning but should just be.  Throughout this poem it uses symbols to show how poetry can be dumb, "palpable and mute", wordless, motionless, and not true.  Some examples of the symbolism's used are: the idea of a moon lurking through leaves and branches compared to memories, a flight of birds having direction but are wordless, and a medallion to a thumb is symbolized for dumb.  Also, he says direct lines like, "A poem should not mean...But be."  Basically, his approach is simple and just allows poetry to be words on a page without having to have a meaning.  I like this idea because I believe certain poetry can create different responses from different people.  Just as in English class when a poem is presented, everyone has their own interpretation.  I think there is a leniency that this author allows in this poem which creates an atmosphere that allows people to be free with poetry.

How to Read a Poem by Brooke1020

After reading this instructional about how to approach a poem, there was a sense of relief for me in my approach to poetry.  I have always understood poetry as a form of art using a creative style to say something.  I'm sure that some successful poetry comes in this form, but not all.  In reading this instructional on, How to Read a Poem, it mentions that "sometimes the job of the poem is to come closer to saying what cannot be said in other forms of writing..."  I agree completely with this quote because poetry can take you to an experience or feeling that wouldn't otherwise be able to put into words. 
The piece goes into understanding poetry further with ways to approach certain poems: grammatical tendencies, text and context and talking back to the poem.  I thought this idea of talking back to the poem was a little strange but it can reveal an avenue in which you may be able to find out more about the poem.  Once you can go further than the poem and understand who the author is, a certain time era, etc., then your better able to guess the meaning.  Although, you don't always have to know the meaning of a poem to appreciate it.  Sometimes a poem just is.

Where I Lived and What I Lived For by Brooke 1020

Okay, I must say to blog on this I had to re-read certain parts of this piece.  There was so much detail and different tangents and directions that it was hard to keep in line with where the author was going.  Granted when the author did stick with one part of the piece and described it in detail, he did a great job of catching my attention.  It's just when he moved around so much I tended to loose track of the storyline somewhat.  From this piece I gathered that this author definitely enjoyed nature, imagination, beautiful scenery (nature), ideas of taking advantage of life and not in a hurried some way, didn't like post offices, and thought we should take the approach to life like nature does and not be "thrown off the track by every nutshell and mosquito's wing that falls on the rails."
My favorite line of the piece is, "I wanted to live deep and suck out all the marrow of life, to live so sturdily and Spartan-like as to put to rout all that was not life, to cut a broad swath and shave close, to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest terms..."  The line goes further on, but I love the depth of the first part of the sentence.  The author of this piece is great at illustrations, but still I get lost sometimes on his tangents. 
I can't say I would or could handle too many of the authors stories, but perhaps I'm not an advanced enough reader.