Analysis Of The Poem Not Waving But Drowning By Stevie...

Five Poem Assignment 1. â€Å"Not Waving but Drowning† by Stevie Smith has three stanzas, all of which are quatrains and are rhymed abcb . The genre is a lyric and the theme is death and isolation. In the beginning of the poem, the narrator tells us that nobody heard the drowning man or his recounting moans for help yet he continued to cry, waving his arms hoping someone would come and save him. By waving his arms the crowd believed that this was just a friendly gesture so we can interpret that at that very moment the man drowning was already a goner. In the second stanza it gets quite hazy because we are unaware if the speaker at this moment is the narrator of the poem or if it is the voice of those in the crowd watching the drowning. The†¦show more content†¦He settles on a painting, Brueghel s, â€Å"Icarus†, which hangs in the Musee de Beaux Arts in Brussels. Auden begins to discuss the different parts and structures of the painting and how the ideas coming from the painting are showing the indifference of humankind. This painting visually represents the thoughts of destruction that occur in life and how it is quite leisurely talked about. Irony is depicted in the poem in final 2 lines when the ship fails to notice â€Å" something amazing, a boy falling out of the sky† as it â€Å" Had somewhere to get to and sailed calmly on.† This statement is ironic because it is saying that suffering is all around us but it is up to us whether we want to notice it or take responsibility for it. 3. â€Å"Facing It† by Yussef Komunyakaa has one stanza and is a free verse poem. The genre is a lyric and the theme is war and survival. The poem describes a visit to the vietnam memorial in Washington D.C, by an African American veteran who experiences the post-traumatic stresses of war. â€Å"Facing it† is a meaningful title because it is about facing the survival of war. The visit to the Memorial is an emotional experience for the narrator and once he reaches the stone wall, he sees his reflection and the image he sees depicts his own memories of the war. He promises himself that he will not cry but the â€Å"survivor guilt† takes over. Most of the emotional distress comes from the guilt of surviving while others unfortunately die. The narratorShow MoreRelatedPoem Analysis : Not Waving But Drowning1263 Words   |  6 Pages The poem Not Waving but Drowning was published in 1957 and is one of Stevie Smith s most well-known poems. Reading the poem, some may feel a chill of desperation and a sense of longing for someone. The plot of the story is a man s journey to a place of despair ,and no matter what the man accomplishes he will eventually drown.Stevie Smith s Not waving but Drowning uses figures of speech such as imagery, and allegory. The imagery adds a visual to what the characters world is like in his eyes,Read MoreStudy Notes on Out of the Blue by Simon Armitage3230 Words   |  13 PagesAnalysis of the poem Simon Armitages poem Out of the Blue is taken his from 2008 anthology of the same name. According to the books publishers, the poems in the anthology are presented in the form of a respone to  three separate conflicts, all of which have  changed the  world we live  in. Told from the point of view of an English trader working in the North Tower of the World Trade Centre, the poem forms part of the film Out Of The Blue  commissioned by Channel 5 and broadcast five years after