Yet Do I Marvel

Although Cullen believes that God had good intentions and is holy, he also acknowledges that God is the cause of evil in the world, which conveys how he is confused and uncertain about the higher power.
Cullen originally expresses the traditional Christian belief that God is both good and holy.  The first life, and ultimately the most prominent, is "I doubt not God is good, well-meaning, kind" (1).  In this line alone, Cullen expresses complete certainty regarding the subject, explicitly saying "I doubt not."  However, as the poem continues, extreme certainty about God and His intentions does not seem to be the case.
Following his seemingly certain belief in God's good intentions, Cullen then alludes to the bad things that God is responsible for, such as how it is odd and unfair that humans, though created in God's image, are not immortal and must die.  Cullen then alludes to the image of Adam and Eve, as he talks of one being "baited by the fickle fruit" (6).  However, Cullen does not express the situation being Adam and Eve's fault, he places the responsibility of not consuming the fruit on the fruit that was created by God Himself.  By using the word "baited," Cullen is removing the blame from those who ate the fruit since they were put in a trap that forced them to do so.
Cullen expresses how he aims to question God and his belief system.  This is seen in Cullen's attempt to understand God's motives and tries to comprehend "What awful brain compels His awful hand" (12).  He ends the poem by acknowledging how God was cruel to him.  God created him, a black poet, and is pushing him to share his work, which is an unfair and unusual combination.
Overall, Cullen is both impresses and displeased by God.  Although he knows and is confident in the fact that God is good and well-meaning, He can also be cruel and unfair, causing terrible events to take place, creating a contradictory belief system.

1984 Quotes

• "You had to live-did live, from habit that became instinct-in the assumptions that every sound you made was overheard, and, except in darkness, every movement was scrutinized" (3)
• Party's slogans: "War is peace / Freedom is slavery / Ignorance is strength" (4)
• "In a lucid moment Winston found that he was shouting with the others and kicking his heel violently against the rung of his chair.  The horrible thin about the Two Minutes Hate was not that one was obliged to act a part, but that it was impossible to avoid joining in" (14)
• "Of course he chanted with the rest: it was impossible to do otherwise.  To dissemble your feelings, to control your face, to do what everyone else was doing, was an instinctive reaction" (17)
• "Tragedy, he perceived, belonged to the ancient time, to a time when there were still privacy, love, and friendship, and when the members of a family stood by one another without needing to know the reason" (30)
• "If the Party could thrust its hand into the past and say of this or that event, it never happened-that, surely, was more terrifying than mere torture and death" (34)
• "Don't you see that the whole sim of Newspeak is to narrow the range of thought?  In the end we shall make thought crime literally impossible, because there will be no words in which to express it" (52)
• "It was assumed that when he was not working, eating, or sleeping he would be taking part in some kind of communal recreations: to do anything that suggested a taste for solitude, even to go for a walk by yourself, was always slightly dangerous" (82)
• "At the sight of the words I love you the desire to stay alive had welled up in him, and the taking of minor risks suddenly seemed stupid" (109)
• "She had even (an infallible mark of good reputation) been picked out to work in Pornosec, the sub-section of the Fiction Department which turned out cheap pornography for distribution among the proles" (130)
• "He learned with astonishment that all the workers in the Pornosec, except the head of the department, were girls.  The theory was that men, whose sex instincts were less controllable than those of women, were in greater danger of being corrupted by the filth they handled" (131)
• "Life as she saw it was quite simple.  You wanted a good time; 'they,' meaning the Party, wanted to stop you having it; you broke the rules as best you could" (131)
• "To hang on from day to day and from week to week, spinning out a present that had no future, seemed an unconquerable instinct, just as one's lungs will always draw the next break so long as there is air available" (152)
• "The terrible thing that the Party had done was to persuade you that mere impulses, mere feelings, were of no account, while at the same time robbing you of all power over the material world" (164)
• "The proles, it suddenly occurred to him, had remained in this condition.  They were not loyal to a party or a country or an idea, they were loyal to one another.  For the first time in his life he did not despise the proles or think of them merely as an inert force which would one day spring to life and regenerate the world.  The proles had stayed human" (165)

TTL 7

Throughout the novel, Lily goes back and forth on her opinions of Mrs. Ramsay and all that she embodies.  In some parts, Lily looks almost longingly at Mrs. Ramsay.  Mrs. Ramsay acts as a stereotypical housewife in the novel, providing endless support for both her husband and her children.  Lily, in contrast, is a working, independent, yet lonely woman.  In these instances, Lily acknowledges the work that Mrs. Ramsay puts into her life and how fulfilling and loving Mrs. Ramsay's life truly is.  At other times, Lily looks at Mrs. Ramsay with disgust.  In these instances, Lily views Mrs. Ramsay as a symbol of patriarchal society, saying that she could be considered so much more successful if she were independent, working, and helped herself instead of others.  Following Mrs. Ramsay's death, Lily initially shows no true feelings.  She cannot express herself in words, which shows her in contrast to Mrs. Ramsay's feminine side.  Finally, in chapter seven, Lily expresses her pain regarding the death of Mrs. Ramsay, especially when she realizes that after all this time, "she remained a skimpy old maid" (181).  As a fairly unfeminine character, this is a big step for Lily and her possible understanding of Mrs. Ramsay.  Similarly, the same goes for Woolf's feelings towards her mother.  Although Woolf oftentimes struggled to comprehend her mother's motives, given both that Woolf was incredibly young when she died and that Woolf was a strong, working woman compared to her stereotypical housewife of a mother.  However, in this point of the story, Woolf is finally able to accept the fact that feelings cannot be hidden, even for an unfeminine, strong, working woman.

TTL #6

In this section, Lily clearly acts as Woolf through her late exploration of the feelings she feels towards Mrs. Ramsay, who symbolizes Woolf's late mother.  Lily first expresses complete distress and confusion towards the lack of Mrs. Ramsay's presence, very similar to how Woolf must have felt as a child following her parents' deaths: "What does it mean then, what can it all mean?" (Woolf 145).  Lily then attempts to put her feelings into words and finds that she is incapable of doing so: "what did she feel...?  Nothing, nothing-nothing that she could express at all" (Woolf 145).  Words are not complex enough to explain the overcoming of emotions that one feels after a loved one dies, especially when the person himself, namely a child, is not complex enough to explain his feelings.  In this way, Lily acts as a young Virginia Woolf, where the feeling of loss and the concept of death are unable to be described by the simple mind of a child.  However, Lily's remembrance of the painting and determination to complete it is also a symbol of Woolf's relationship with her late mother.  Many years later, Lily decides to finish the painting that she had started which was inspired by Mrs. Ramsay.  This act is like Woolf writing this novel so many years after her mother had passed.  Both acts are the respective artists trying to more clearly understand a loved one after her death,

TTL 2

In this section of To the Lighthouse, Mr. Ramsay contemplates his reputation due to his abilities and mental vitality.  In his analogy, humans theoretically have the capability to start at point A and end at point Z, however, very few make it that far.  He, himself, is metaphorically stuck at R, which displeases him, even though only "one in a generation" will make it all the way to Z (35).  However, Mr. Ramsay does not seem personally distressed with his own failure, but he seems to be worried as to how he will be perceived.  He asks if he is "to be blamed then if he is not that one [who completes the alphabet] provided he has toiled honestly, given to the best of his power, and till he has no more left to give" (35).  At first, it seems as if Ramsay is personally upset at his inability, meaning that he wants to try more to live up to his fullest potential.  However, he then comments that "it is permissible even for a dying hero to think before he dies how men will speak to him hereafter... His own little light would shine, not very brightly, for a year or two" (35).  His seemingly persistent thoughts of improvement are then shown to truly be selfish acts of vanity; He only truly cares about how society perceives him.  Although this idea of extreme vanity might seem over the top, it is one that many people can relate to, especially seniors in high school.  Society sets such high standards that every person feels he must reach in order to be successful and seen as such.

TTL 1

In the first chapter of Woolf's To the Lighthouse, the characters are introduced to the reader.  One of the most prominent characterizations that stands out is that of James Ramsay.  After his father disagrees with his mother, James feels a violent, murderous feeling towards his father: Had there been an axe handy, or a poker, any weapon that would have gashed a hole in his father's breast and killed him, there and then, James would have seized it" (4).  First, this statement is alarming and makes the readers question James, though we know very little about him.  It seems as if he is mentally unstable and incapable of making logical decisions.  Although hearing disagreeable news can make someone upset, he or she should not feel violent as a result.  The readers also learn about his relationship with his father, which is clearly an unhealthy one.  James's feelings of violence are not solely a result of the news his father brings, but result from "his [father's] mere presence," which is a sign of an unhealthy relationship, very different from most father and sons (4).  The readers also gain insight on James's relationship with his mother, since he believes his mother to be "ten thousand times better in every way than [his father] was" (4).  These combined aspects that are used to characterize James in the first pages of the novel leave the reader wondering about who he truly is as a person, why he is this way, and what will happen as a result.

Traveling through the dark by William Stafford

In Traveling through the dark, the speaker addresses the grieving process in an abstract way.   Driving along a narrow, dangerous road, the speaker encounters a recently killed deer.  The driver knows that it is safer to move the carcass than it is to swerve around it and risk hitting another animal or causing a fatal accident.  As the speaker is moving the dead body of the deer, he notices that the side of her body is still warm.  He realizes that this is because the deer was pregnant, and "her fawn lay there waiting, / alive, still, never to be born" (10-11).  In this description, the speaker is showing how this encounter means more to him than just seeing a dead animal on the road.  He stops and almost grieves as he hesitates and is unsure of what to do.  However, time is passing and the speaker realizes he cannot wait there forever, which the reader can tell by his describing how the car is still running: "The car aimed ahead its lowered parking lights; / under the hood purred the steady engine" (13-14).  He then pushes the dead deer and her trapped fetus into the river.  This encounter symbolizes the grieving process of losing a loved one.  One must first face the issue, coming to a realization that the person is dead, as seen by the person stopping his car and assessing the situation.  Then, one can grieve and face his loss, as seen through the speaker hesitating and looking into the deer's condition in more detail.  In the end, however, life still continues, much like the running car waiting to move on to the next adventure.  As a result, one must let go of the past, try to put aside the death, metaphorically pushing it into the river, and continue on with his life.

Picnic, Lightning by Billy Collins

With the start of this poem, the reader first thinks that the speaker is going to talk about his fear of death given that his "mother died in a freak accident" (1).  However, the speaker goes on to discuss his accepting of the fact that death will find everyone no matter what he or she does.  The speaker gives examples of freak accidents that could happen in one's home at any time, showing how death is eminent: "It is possible to be struck by a meteor / or a single-engine plane / while reading in a chair at home" (3-5).  By giving these specific examples as opposed to preventable scenarios or events that happen outside of the house, the speaker is showing that death is not something one should avoid by not living one's life to the fullest and by living in fear.  However, the speaker also expresses that he thinks about death's inevitable nature far beyond what is healthy as he says that "This is what [he] think[s] about / when [he] shovel[s] compost" (20-21).  Although the speaker does not express extreme amounts of anxiety and fear regarding death coming for him, he does express and unnatural, unhealthy fixation on its inevitability.  But, in the end, he considers how time is forever passing, "as one hour sweeps into the next," and death is one step closer for every person (40).

My Number by Billy Collins

In this poem, the speaker personifies death in order to express his fear and nervousness regarding death's approaching him.  The speaker first personifies death in a subdued way, talking about the things that death can do, such as "tampering with air brakes, scattering cancer cells like seeds, loosening the wooden beams of roller coaster" (5-8).  Progressively, the acts in this list become more dramatic and scarier ways to die.  By having a list of scary ways to die, as opposed to common and peaceful ways, such as in one's sleep, the speaker is expressing some fear in death and how it will come to get him.  Then, the speaker personifies death in a very stereotypical, frightening manner, where he is "shaking open the familiar cloak, its hood raised like the head of a crow; and removing the scythe from the trunk" (13-15).  Here, the speaker is clearly conveying his terror of death, as death is being portrayed as a dark, violent being, that is ready to slaughter anything in its path.  Throughout the poem, the author expresses concern for death not being able to find him since he lives in a "hidden cottage," but in the end, he explains what he would do if death were to find him (9).  He would "start talking [his] way out of this," which truly shows how fearful he is for death's eminent visit (17).

Heart of Darkness 5

Through varying viewpoints, Joseph Conrad's Heart of Darkness can be perceived as both racist and tolerant towards the African people.  One of the greatest examples of this ambiguity is the presence and role of the cannibals that Marlow encounters.  On one hand, Marlow is describing the worst image of an African culture that a racist European society can imagine.  He expresses slight fear of being eaten and hope towards looking "unappetizing" (Conrad 116).  However, with the descriptions of the cannibal people, though not completely positive, Marlow expresses admiration for their restraint.  He expresses some sense of sympathy towards the men after realizing that they must not have eaten recently and that they have consequently become weaker.  He describes the men as "with courage, with strength, even yet, though their skins were no longer glossy and their muscles no longer hard" (Conrad 116).  In this sentence, he both compliments the men, calling them courageous and strong, and feels bad that they were forced to become physically weaker.  In addition, Marlow recognizes their strength and willpower of the restraint it has taken for these men to temporarily not eat usual food source.  He compares their restraint to that of "a hyena prowling amongst the corpses of a battlefield" (Conrad 117).  Through one lens, this description could be seen as a racist remark, referring to black men as manipulative and sneaky animals.  However, on the other hand, Marlow is commending the men for the great strength and expressing how hard this experience must be for them.

Heart of Darkness 3

Unlike Achebe's argument, Conrad's Heart of Darkness is not a "thoroughgoing racist" piece, as shown through the ambiguous nature of the descriptions Conrad uses.  Achebe first argues that the piece is racist by claiming that Africa is an antithesis of civilized Europe, Conrad is implying that Africans are savages.  However, Conrad also refers to Africa as an undiscovered Europe.  If viewed as an earlier version of Europe as opposed to a contrasting point of European culture, Conrad is simply implying that Africa will soon become developed like his homeland and that Europe had only been developed by the mere chance of someone landing on European soil instead of African soil.  Achebe also argues that Conrad's referring to African people as "a mass of hands clapping, of feet stamping, of bodies swaying, of eyes rolling" is blatantly racist since the people are being identified as parts of their body and no more (Achebe 3).  However, one could argue that these are features that emphasize the humanity in the African people by pinpointing the similarities that they share with Europeans by referring to their various body parts.  Lastly, one could argue that Conrad's continuously referring to "the white of their eyeballs" is explicitly showing the contrast between black and white as seen on the faces of African people (Achebe 4).  However, by showing that black people essentially have the same starkly white eyes as white people, Conrad is emphasizing the similarities between the two groups, especially with eyes, which are known as the windows to the soul.  Most of Conrad's seemingly racist statements could truly be his subtle way of emphasizing the humanity of the African people.

AP Poetry Practice Essay

In both Piano and The Days Gone By, the authors create a warm and nostalgic feeling towards their childhoods through the imagery and tone of the poems.
By discussing warm moments in time, from both the present and the past, the author of Piano portrays the security and happy innocence of his childhood.  Before discussing his own childhood, the poet describes a present day scene of lighthearted joy that reminds him of the past.  He describes "a child sitting under the piano... and pressing the small, poised feet of a mother who smiles as she sings" (Piano 3-4)  The child being underneath the piano, as opposed to sitting next to his mother, creates a sense of innocence as the child is almost unaware of his surroundings and the beauty of being able to see the inner workings of the instrument or his mother's graceful fingers.  In addition, his mother is smiling while she sings, which shows the happiness that surrounds being a child.  In addition to the clear happiness in smiling, music itself provides an overwhelming sense of feeling, usually positive, and the ability to lose oneself in emotion, similar to the previously mentioned innocence.  This visual brings the poet back to his childhood, as he wishes he could go back in time to those amazing moments.  He describes his own childhood memories as "hymns in the cosy parlour, the tinkling piano our guide" (Piano 8).  Using the word "hymns" instead of "songs" provide a sense of comfort because hymns are often associated with religion.  By referring to the parlour as "cosy" instead of  "comfortable," there is a stronger association with love and family, similar to using "home" instead of  "house."  The author of Piano further expresses his emotion towards his childhood by saying that he "weep[s] like a child for the past" (Piano 12).  In addition to showing his love for his childhood, this statement portrays the freedom for children to openly express their emotions, which the author also desires.  Through both the descriptions of the past and present, the author of Piano expresses his nostalgia towards his childhood and the comfort and warmth it provided.
Similarly, the author of The Days Gone By expresses his admiration towards his childhood.  Several times, the poet uses the phrase "O the days gone by!" (The Days Gone By 1).  Had the author used the same statement without the initial interjection or the final punctuation mark, the statement would not have the same impact.  By including these two features, and repeating the exclamation multiple times, the author is able to portray the emotion and excitement he has about the days that have passed.  In addition, the author uses a rhyming pattern of couplets, which portrays a jovial, innocent, childlike tone to the poem, allowing the reader to understand the author's happiness about the subject.  In the first stanza, the poet focuses on imagery of beautiful aspects of nature in a meadow, portraying the beauty of childhood.  For example, he discusses that "the bloom was on the clover, and the blue was in the sky," which is an image filled with beauty and vibrancy (The Days Gone By 5).  In the second stanza, the poet focuses more on the innocence that childhood involves, using descriptive words such as "tangled" and "tripped" to describe aspects of nature, though not with a negative connotation, but to add to nature's beauty (The Days Gone By 8).  In the final stanza, similar to in Piano, the author uses the imagery of music to portray the beauty and happiness of his childhood.  He also reminisces over the belief in magic that he had as a child, stating that there was a "simple. soul-reposing, glad belief in everything," which reinforces how the innocence he had as a child made his childhood happy and beautiful (The Days Gone By 16).  He calls his childhood "a story, holding neither sob nor sigh," in that it was a simpler time where he was happier (The Days Gone By 17).
Overall, both authors use imagery to portray the beauty and innocence of their childhoods and how the past was a happier, more jovial time.

The Telephone by Maya Angelou

In The Telephone, Maya Angelou personifies a telephone to portray the loneliness that the lack of phone calls causes the speaker of the poem to feel.  The speaker of the poem refers to the telephone as "a strict and spinstered aunt."  That image in itself, often viewed as an old woman, sitting alone, surrounded by cats and an endless supply of knitting projects, evokes a feeling of loneliness and desperation.  Then, the speaker of the poem expresses how this spinster ignores her as the spinster is busy interfering in the lives of others: "busy with the hemming of strangers' overlong affairs of the darning of [her] neighbors' worn-out dreams."  Through this metaphor, one can infer that others are constantly on the telephone, building the foundation of their social lives.  But for the speaker of the poem, however, the telephone "sits silent," as she gets no telephone calls.  Unlike the other people around her, the speaker of the poem lacks the companions and social life to receive many calls from friends, lovers, and family, which she finds distressing.  The speaker of the poem ends the piece with "Ring.  Damn you!"  This statement, though incredibly simple, shows the disappointment and anger that the speaker feels from her lack of telephone calls.  Instead of ending the poem with a period, she uses an exclamation point, which shows how strongly she feels about the subject and how truly upset she is.

A Broken Appointment by Thomas Hardy

The speaker in the poem addresses the idea of love and how that concept relates to loyalty.  The speaker of the poem is forgotten by the woman that he loves.  She does not come to meet him like he thought she would.  He takes this as a sign that she does not truly love him, especially not how he thought she did: "You love not me."  He jumps to this conclusion because "love alone can lend you [the] loyalty" needed to fulfill a promise, such as meeting him.  Needless to say, the speaker is heartbroken.  He is especially confused since this decision of hers is not congruent with her past behaviors in which she "came to soothe a time-torn man."  He finishes this statement with the idea that she does not love him, which implies that this time-torn man is, in fact, himself.  The speaker is arguing that love is not the only thing that brings about the loyalty to have her meet him.  If that is the case, then why did she not come this time?  Maybe the woman once loved the speaker of the poem.  Maybe there were extenuating circumstances that caused the woman not to come.  The poet probably leaves the answer to this question unknown to show the uncertainty in human emotion.  We, as a society, never truly know other people's thoughts and motives.  Unless people express how they feel, we will never truly understand.  Human nature is incredibly ambiguous, especially regarding love.

35/10 by Sharon Olds

In this poem, Sharon Olds contemplates the ideas of getting older and approaching death.  It is when the speaker of the poem is brushing her daughter's hair that she herself notices her hair becoming gray with age.  Although she could view this as a positive aspect of her life, since with age comes wisdom and knowledge, the speaker takes this as a sign of her numbered days and mortality.  Instead of viewing aging as the growth and maturing of her mind and soul, she views it as a decay of her body, especially through comparison to her young daughter: "As my skin shows its dry pitting, she opens like a moist precise flower on the tip of a cactus."  The speaker describes her aging as dangerous and unmanageable, like a pit.  She describes her daughter's aging and maturing as beautiful and natural, like a flower.  Although, the flower is surrounded by the dangerous spikes of a cactus, possibly showing how this beautiful maturing will inevitably become something bad and dangerous: the decay of body and soul.  In the end, the speaker of the poem views aging in a selfish manner, claiming that growing old and eventually dying is simply a means of replacing mother with daughter, old with new.

God, A Poem by James Fenton

Through his lighthearted manner, James Fenton discusses the serious concept and belief in God, and all that He provides to the average person.  He initially blames God for commonplace, unpleasant events, such as "a drawing-pin caught in your sock."  After listing a few humorously unpleasant events, Fenton claims that these unpleasant events are "all that you'll get from th'Almighty," and that the afterlife is not any more pleasant than that.  He then goes on to claim that God does not care about major catastrophes, such as the Flood, nor is he responsible for amazing phenomenon, such as Salvation.  In this poem, God claims to be "a crude existential malpractice."  God then uses the same unpleasant events to describe the speaker, saying that he also will be no better in the afterlife or be seen better after he has died.  Fenton describes the common struggle we, as a society, have with religion and grappling with the idea of an existing higher power, in which the extent that God sees, is responsible for, and cares about is questionable.  In this way, this poem is very relatable to the common person.  Fenton expresses a belief that God is truly responsible for very little, yet can determine each individual's outcome.  This idea goes along with the belief of an unjust, unmerciful higher power.  In addition, Fenton also expresses the idea that God is not fully aware of every person on the planet, that we, as individuals, are truly insignificant.