What Are Years by Marianne Moore

What struck my interest about “What Are Years” by Marianne Moore is the doubt that comes from the poem. “What is our innocence, what is our guilt? All are naked, none is safe.” (Moore. 452) When I read these lines I feel that Moore depicts are birth when she says “we are all born naked.” We all are born naked. “None is safe,” could mean that we don’t know how our life will go. As we live our life we learn certain rules and guidelines that are supposed to make us socially accepted in ones culture. Moore is trying to challenge what is socially accepted by asking what is or innocence, what is our guilt? I also like the last three lines in stanza three because in a way it plays off the first stanza. “Though he is captive, his mighty signing says, satisfaction is a lowly thing, how pure a thing is joy. This is mortality, this is eternity.” (Moore. 452) What I get is Moore is saying that even if he is imprisoned, you can imprisoned your soul are your joy. By realizing the joy in your life your soul will have an eternity of happiness.

---Richard Liptak

Unharvested by Robert Frost

Robert Frost gives the reader a visual picture of an apple tree. The first line of “Unharvested” stuck my attention. “A scent of ripeness from over a wall.” (Frost. 227) That like struck my attention because I now I just don’t have a visual picture of an apple but I have the scent of an apple in my head too. As the poem goes on I get this picture of a sky-blue, hot summer day and I am traveling down a road were I see and smell the shiniest red apples you ever see. As I walk closer to this apple tree, the hot summer day starts to clam down and a breeze goes by. This apple tree has the greenest leafs and the reddest juicy apples around. “As complete as the apple had given man. The ground was one circle of solid of red.” (Frost. 227) As I keep walking, fallen apples engulf the green grass. The smell of apples has now become even stronger. “May something go always unharvested! May much stay out of our stated plan, Apples or something forgotten and left, So smelling their sweetness would be no theft.” (Frost. 227) What I get from the last stanza is that an apple so colorful and rich that is not picked from a tree is left forgotten. When apple picking no one wants to get the apples on the floor they want to pick the apples off the tree. The solid red floor of apples are forgotten. Apples that may not be eaten and will become unharvested. When Frost says that it would be no theft to smell their sweetness he is saying that you can’t eat or take all the apples but you can get the scent of all the apples together before they become unharvested.

---Richard Liptak

The Death of a Soldier by Wallace Stevens

I like how Stevens compare the life of a soldier to an autumn day. When reading “The Death of a Soldier” I pictured this soldier that is going into battle knowing that he may not can back in the shape he was or if he will still be living. I get this vivid image of this soldier lining up in his platoon and embarking on his mission. As he looks around people are getting shot and falling down one by one like leafs that fall from an autumn tree. As I keep reading “He does not become a three-day’ personage, Imposing his separation, Calling for pomp.” (Stevens pg. 246) I get the impression that this soldier got shoot. The soldier is down but still wants to fight not because he wants to be a celebrity but to defend his honor, shooting other soldiers off one by one but more of he enemy still coming know that he is going to die looking death right in the eye looking for his own splendor. Eventually he can fight the enemy of anymore and dies. Instead of giving him a proper memorial he is pushed aside so other soldiers can fight. “When the wind stops and, over the heavens, The cloud go, nevertheless, In their direction.” (Stevens pg. 246) After the battle has ended and the retreat was made that battleground that saw death and violence now is a vast space of emptiness. The soldiers death represents the wind stopping but the clouds go represents the soul and sacrifice that this unnamed soldier made.

---Richard Liptak

Death by William Carlos Williams

I like the poem Death by William Carlos Williams because this is a poem of how he deals with the death of his father. The poem seems to be a very dark and upsetting poem. What strikes me to this poem is the tone of this poem. Williams is describing how the dog won’t have to sleep on his potatoes (toes) anymore to keep them from freezing. “he’s dead the old bastard – He’s a bastard because there’s nothing legitimate in him any more he’s dead” (Williams pg. 295) I find that an unusually passage because there is “nothing legitimate in him anymore”, gives me the impression that Williams think with his fathers death that there will be no love for him anymore. The nothing in him could possibly mean the love in their father and son relationship. I feel that Williams is mad about his father dieing. That he is upset because Williams feels abandon. The last line “He’s sick-dead” could mean that he died sick or that Williams is sick that his father is dead.

---Richard Liptak

The Pool by Hilda Doolittle

I chose The Pool by Hilda Doolittle. because it is such an unusually title for this poem. H.D. starts the poem by saying “Are you alive? I touch you. You quiver like a sea-fish” (H.D. pg 395) This is what came to me when I read it. I did not think of a pool or any sea terms but a different interpretation that maybe a little far off. I pictured a homeless person lying in a cold street in a desolate city. A woman goes over to see if this homeless person is still alive, so she goes over to grab this homeless person and sees that this person is shivering. “I cover you with my net.” (H.D. pg 395) Out of the goodness of her heart she gives this homeless person her jacket. Her “net” for warmth. “What are you----banded one” (H.D. pg 395) I feel that after she gave her jacket to warm this homeless person, she wanted to know more about this homeless person. Branded one also strikes me because banded means marked with bands of different or contrasting colors. I have this vision of this homeless person that is very white, dirty, has a rose color nose because of the cold, and greasy black hair. With all of these different unique colors that this person has she is seeing many contrasts in colors in this homeless person.

--- Richard Liptak