My Poetry Emulation

This Is Just To Say

after William Carlos Williams

Mommy I spilled

my drink

over there by

your books

 

the ones

you probably need

for

your homework

 

Forgive me

it was not

my fault

but Louie and Minnie’s.

Aiden & Minnie. Aiden & Louie. ❤

The Red Wheelbarrow by William Carlos Williams

so much depends
upon

a red wheel
barrow

glazed with rain
water

beside the white
chickens.

It seems odd that Williams would center his entire (short) poem on a static object like a wheelbarrow, but that was his main point in doing so.

The reader’s attention is automatically brought to this single image of a lonely wheelbarrow in the first stanza. It is then accompanied, in the 2nd stanza, by the image of rain water glazing that wheelbarrow. And finally, by the white chickens that stand close by (3rd stanza).

Alone, the three stanzas convey they’re own single image. A wheelbarrow. Rain water. And chickens. But when you put the three images together, you get this beautiful, yet simple, picture of country life. Maybe life on a farm or in a rural area. To some it would seem like a mundane set of images to put together into a poem, but to Williams, it was his way of depicting a moment in time that most people would take advantage of.

Criticisms of The Red Wheelbarrow all come to the same conclusion about what the main idea of this poem is: it’s a look into something so seemingly simple that, when looked at as a whole and in the right perspective, can be beautiful and moving.

Williams was one of the leading imagist poets, following Ezra Pound, whom he took influence from. His reasoning for writing his poems in short stanzas and with single images was to show the simplicity and the beauty of what he was conveying. It was the idea to take a moment to enjoy the small, seemingly insignificant things in life.

As an adult, I know I tend to look at the bigger picture of life. It’s always about: what bills do I need to pay or what should I make for dinner or when do I go into work. Sometimes I find myself lost in the thoughts of the many things I need to do in my day. It isn’t until my son comes home that I can find myself slowing down a little bit and just enjoying life.

Ever since my son was born, I’ve found myself taking a moment just to drink him in, every little smile and laugh and word he says. Even when i’ve had the longest and hardest of days, just being with my son makes all those things disappear. I like to watch him as he plays and see the look of concentration on his face as he tries to piece together a wooden jigsaw puzzle. The sound of his laugh as he watches his favorite tv show or movie. The rise and fall of his chest as he begins to fall asleep. The little things that make him, him.

The same should be done with all things in life. We should all take a moment to watch a cloud drift across the sky or witness a bee land on a flower and collect pollen. We all tend to lead busy and chaotic lives, but we should also take a leaf from Williams’ book and just slow down and enjoy the scenery before us.

If I give Aiden a piece of advice concerning Williams’ The Red Wheelbarrow, it would be to slow down, to take notice of the little things and to not worry so much on the big picture of life, to once and awhile take notice of the things we usually don’t notice. Aiden may only be three-years-old, and he may, for the time being, live life in this very way that he recognizes only the here and now, but I would advise him to keep that mentality throughout his life. Take a moment to smell the roses, as it were, and enjoy the simple things that life puts before us.

 

The Road Not Taken by Robert Frost

 

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, And sorry I could not travel both And be one traveler, long I stood And looked down one as far as I could To where it bent in the undergrowth; Then took the other, as just as fair, And having perhaps the better claim, Because it was grassy and wanted wear; Though as for that the passing there Had worn them really about the same, And both that morning equally lay In leaves no step had trodden black. Oh, I kept the first for another day! Yet knowing how way leads on to way, I doubted if I should ever come back. I shall be telling this with a sigh Somewhere ages and ages hence: Two roads diverged in a wood, and I-- I took the one less traveled by, And that has made all the difference.

Robert Frost brings up an age-old question of: what is the right path to choose in life? Although some may argue that there is no real right or wrong answer, as there may truly be no right or wrong path, Frost suggests doing the unexpected, the uncertain, and going down the path that is not always chosen.

He brings up the image of a fork in the road, “Two roads diverged.” Immediately you can imagine yourself standing at this crossroad, unsure of which side to choose, “sorry I could not travel both.” Frost adds this line, I think, because most people would consider the idea of wanting to know what awaits them at the end of either road. It’s kind of like those choose your own adventure novels, like the ones by R.L. Stine. Where a scenario would be set and after a few paragraphs you would have to decide whether to follow the creepy monster to see where his lair is, or to run away screaming in the other direction. I know I’m guilty of trying to flip back and forth to try and find out what kind of outcome would occur at the end of each scenario. It’s human nature to want to know exactly what is going to happen.

Frost writes, “I stood and looked down one as far as I could,” his way of saying that we all try to crane our necks to see what is coming up ahead without actually going there to see it. He continues by describing the road as “bent in the undergrowth,” making it clear that he cannot completely see where this road is going. He decides to take the 2nd road, “just as fair” and “grassy and wanted wear.” The idea of this second road is that it’s the more predictable of the two. It’s the path that most everyone chooses, which is why it is worn down from constant travel. The ideal choice for most people is to take the more predictable one. Most people, myself (for the most part) included, are afraid of the unknown. We are afraid of what we don’t know, what we can’t see and where we will end up.

In the third stanza, Frost claims that “I kept the first for another day!” and then recants by saying that “Yet knowing how way leads to way, I doubted if I should ever come back.” We all have that habit. Like when we resolve to start losing weight at the beginning of the next week… that week turns into ‘well, maybe next week,’ and on and on until we realize that we never really went through what we promised ourselves in the beginning. Frost is true to himself in saying that “I doubted if I should ever come back” because in “knowing how way leads to way” he knows that life happens and we are sometimes unable to return to that road in life where we wanted to try something new and different.

The last stanza of the poem has a resonating impact on me.

I shall be telling this with a sigh
Somewhere ages and ages hence:
Two roads diverged in a wood, and I–
I took the one less traveled by,
And that has made all the difference.

 Frost speaks of looking back fondly on that moment in time where he decided to do something that was unexpected, and how much of a difference it has made on his life. It will always remind me of the moment when my husband and I (who were only dating at the time) decided to have a child together. We were young, only 21 years old, but it was something we both wanted. We knew it would be hard and the idea of starting our own family and living on our own was frightening, but we did it anyways. We took a chance. And I can tell you that having my son, Aiden, was the best decision, the best path, that I could have taken. It’s been hard and unexpected. But knowing that Aiden is one of the best decisions i’ve ever made makes the uncertainty worth it.

If there was anything i’d like Aiden to know about life in connection to Robert Frost’s The Road Not Taken, it would be to follow your heart and choose to do something unexpected. Sometimes that road may lead you some place that you weren’t expecting, but it’s the decisions in life that make us who we are. You shouldn’t have to follow the crowd just because you know where that path is going to end. Try something new. Something different. Something that, at the end of your life, you can look back on and say “I’m glad I did that.” Good or bad, it will make you who you were meant to be.

Tell All the Truth by Emily Dickinson

Tell all the truth but tell it slant,
Success in circuit lies,
Too bright for our infirm delight
The truth’s superb surprise;

As lightning to the children eased
With explanation kind,
The truth must dazzle gradually
Or every man be blind.

Truth is something, Dickinson believed, that must be eased into. To put simply, we must sugar-coat the truth to keep it from blindsiding us.

She says that “success in circuit lies,” which can be interpreted as meaning that the successfulness of telling a lie comes from giving the person to which you are lying, the run-around. That, of course, is if you literally interpret the word circuit, which means a roundabout journey or course. So, for Dickinson, lies are things that are continually circling around us. Maybe even something that we cannot escape.

Dickinson says in her poem that the truth is “too bright for our infirm delight” meaning that people are too weak-minded to be able to wrap our heads around the complete truth of the matter which is being lied about. She says that truth is a “surprise” to people who are unable to recognize a lie when flatly given one. In a way, Dickinson is claiming that people are too weak-minded, maybe even too dim-witted, to understand the difference between lies and the truth.

Dickinson, in the last stanza of the poem, attempts to show how she perceived people that are slowly told the truth. She describes them as “children” who are afraid of lightning. I myself have a small son who was frightened the first time he heard thunder and saw lightning. But with a simple explanation and showing him that there is nothing to be afraid of, it eased his fears of the unknown concept of thunder and lightning. Dickinson describes people as being like my son, afraid of what they don’t understand, but with simple explanation and gentle persuasion they come to realize that there is nothing to fear.

“The truth must dazzle gradually” Dickinson says, “Or every man be blind.” To sum up the entirety of the poem in these two lines, Dickinson is saying that when giving someone the truth, one must do so gently and with some caution. If you give too much of the truth away all at one, it can take the other person by surprise and they can, and will, be caught off guard.

I believe that there are some reasons to, so-call, sugar-coat the truth, but for the most part being blatantly honest is the best course of action. I would rather be hit hard and fast with what is true than guess at what the end out-come will be.