Different Cultures Poetry
A summary of my favourite key points from each of the Cluster 1 poems
4.5 / 5 based on 11 ratings
- Created by: Rebecca
- Created on: 16-05-11 17:22
LIMBO (language)
- knees spread wide
- limbo dance
- balance
- connotations with ****
- burning ground
- pessimistic ending to poem - immense sufferin, haunts the reader
- link to hell (metaphorical)
- stick hit sound
- assonance and sibiliance, creates tension
- monosyllabic - rhythm of dance, conveys bitterness/anger
- ambiguity of stick - brutality and cruelty of treatment or dance
- dumb gods are raising me
- metaphor
- superiority of slavemasters
- gods are incapable of saving them - loss of faith, despair
- sense of hope?
- ambiguity, confusion
1 of 23
LIMBO (structure)
- lack of punctuation
- ongoing, endless suffering
- limitless suffering
- long, thin structure
- confinement
- restrictions of slavery
- refrain
- poem seems like a song
- limbo dance perhaps keeps hope and maintains their sense of community and remembrance of their culture
2 of 23
NOTHING'S CHANGED (language)
- Small round hard stones click
- Monosyllabic
- Bitterness/resentment
- Hard onomatopoeic sound of 'click'
- tall, purple-flowering,/amiable weeds
- strength and sense of belonging, native
- pest/unwanted
- friendly
- beautiful, colourful, vibrant life
- and
- repetition
- flow of emotion, building anger
- loss of control
- sentences also get longer
- labouring of my lungs
- alliteration
- increase pace and show flowing emotions
- vulnerability
3 of 23
NOTHING'S CHANGED (more language)
- Brash with glass
- half-rhyme
- conspicuous, don't belong
- disjointed, tension
- flaring like a flag
- simile
- invasion
- reflects sound of a flag
- incipient Port Jackson trees
- don't belong, new, just starting
- capitalisation makes them stand out
- more luxurious than weeds
- half-rhyme of 'trees' and 'weeds'
- clear panes
- invisible barrier between them
- metaphorical
- plastic v linen
- luxury v poor
- strenght v easily torn - fragility of relying on material possessions
4 of 23
NOTHING'S CHANGED (structure)
- Equal length stanzas
- black and white people should be equal
- gaps between stanzas may represent segregation
- Central 2-line stanza
- emphasises key message of the poem
- conveys bitterness, monosyllabic
- isolation of black people
- Ending same words as title
- emphasises lack of change
- cyclic structure, no escape, can't break free
- short sentence conveys frustration and anger
- lack of progress
5 of 23
ISLAND MAN (language)
- wombing
- made up word - can't express his emotions, language barrier
- safety and comfort of island - origin
- onomatopoeic, calming
- Island man
- isolation
- love of islan, but UK is an island too?
- small emerald island
- vulnerability
- worth, value, precious to him
- vibrant colour
- groggily groggily
- repetition
- confusio - blur of two places
- alliteration, almost clumsy
- grey metallic soar
- juxtaposition of colour/dull
- cold, manmade, hard compared to island
6 of 23
ISLAND MAN (more language)
- soar and roar
- rhyme, bombarding, surrounding sound
- powerful, everything is against him
- sands
- ambiguous, confusion, blur of cultures
- should be 'sounds'?
- heaves himself
- reluctance
- despises new culture
- Another London day
- routine
- endless
- blue surf
- vibrant colour
- he likes ocean because it forms the island, separation
- clean, pure, calm
7 of 23
ISLAND MAN (structure)
- stanza 1 seems quite regular
- comfort of the island
- half-rhyme of 'head' and 'steady' creates rhythm
- second stanza seems disjointed
- confused emotions
- disjointed life, no longer content
- separation from regularity of island
- no longer belongs
- transition from asleep to awake
- could reflect the waves, linking back to the island
- no punctuation
- never-ending cycle
- blur of emotions
- blur of cultures
- difficult to read, reader can empathise with narrator's discomfort
8 of 23
BLESSING (language)
- The skin cracks like a pod
- monosyllabic, lack of water, anger at injustice
- cracks, onomatopoeic, conveys severity of pain
- whose skin? earth? human? (simile)
- Imagine
- imperative
- reader can engage with narrator
- voice of a kindly god
- water is a gift from god
- importance of religion (poem title)
- incredible value of water, significance
- roar of tongues
- community, power in numbers, working together
- metaphor - lion, strength
- animalistic, atavistic desire for water
- silver crashes
- value of water
- associates water with wealth, hints at injustice, rich and poor
9 of 23
BLESSING (more language)
- pots,/ brass, copper, aluminium,/plastic buckets,/frantic hands
- list conveys excitement, perhaps hints at desperation
- community is eager to have water
- screaming in the liquid sun
- light, hope, warmth, comfort (sun and water both bring life)
- ambiguous, screaming hints at celebration and suffering
- perhaps linked to hell?
- polished to perfection
- alliteration (plosives)
- comfort and unity water brings
- yet perhaps only superficial, exterior benefits
- blessing sings
- personification of blessing
- celebration, music
- small bones
- reminder of poverty, benefits are fleeting, poverty remains
- vulnerability and fragility remains
- pessimistic ending to the poem
10 of 23
BLESSING (structure)
- monosyllabic opening with short sentences
- lack of water
- discomfort before the event
- enjambment in second stanza
- flow of water
- emphasised by rhyme (found/ground/around)
- shows how event brings community together
- places 'fortune' and 'silver' at start of line, significant, show value
11 of 23
TWO SCAVENGERS (language)
- plastic v linen
- bright, colourful and vibrant v dull and plain
- cheap v luxury
- disposable v valuable
- strength v fragility (reliance on worldldy possessions)
- hanging on and looking down
- metaphorical interpretation
- life is a struggle
- resilient and determined
- perhaps they comdemn rich lifestyle and disapprove
- poet thinks poor are in fact superior to rich
- grungy v casually coifed
- contrast, dirty and clean
- alliteration, sarcasm
- casually implies quick yet coifed implies time and effort, contradictory
- on the way (to his architect's office/home)
- two different journeys
- beginning and end of journeys, rich have more to look forward to
- repetition highlights similarity between the two
12 of 23
TWO SCAVENGERS (more language)
- grey iron hair
- metaphor
- strength
- perhaps link to gates, as though they are trapped by poorness
- gargoyle Quasimodo
- simile, comparison to something ugly
- wards away evil from churches, clears street of rubbish
- both are shunned from society
- statue, inactive, unable to change situation
- odorless TV ad
- fake, fantasy
- ironic, they make it 'odorless'
- cool couple
- alliteration
- perhaps sarcastic and mocking
13 of 23
TWO SCAVENGERS (structure)
- disjointed
- reflect waves (high seas/ of this democracy)
- indentation, separation of rich and poor
- overlap shows they share common ground and should be similar
- structure is built on word 'democracy' appears precarious and fragile
- last lines
- very fragmented
- demonstrate injustice and separation
- make lines read at slower pace, sarcasm
- force reader to contemplate about the ideas the poet is portraying
- scavengers are on top of beautiful people
- hints at moral superiority
- represents separation again
- no caesuras
- endless routine of injustice, no escape
- cyclic pattern
- difficult to read, reader can empathise with frustration
14 of 23
NIGHT OF THE SCORPION (language)
- crawl, driven, risked
- scorpion portrayed as innocent
- suggests community response is an overreaction
- they interpret sting as intentional, yet narrator knows its accidental
- swarms of flies
- simile, community is a nuisance
- flies feed on death, they feed of woman's suffering
- compares to animals, they are like scorpion
- vast numbers, more powerful so worse than scorpion
- dehumanises villagers, makes prayers etc. seem foolish
- throwing giant scorpion shadows
- metaphorical, worsen situation
- enlarge the problem
- they said
- repetition, incessant chatter, nuisance, irritating
- one body, sense of community, anonymity
- lack of individual thought
15 of 23
NIGHT OF THE SCORPION (more language)
- I remember the night
- first person feels personal
- directly involves reader so they feel like they're at the scene
- flash/ of diabolic tail in the dark room
- evil, linked to the devil
- juxtaposed with its innocence
- darkness suggests evil and fear
- only said
- juxtaposed with they said
- simplicity, rational
- suggest family is more important than religion or community
- powder, mixture, herb and hybrid
- list shows desperation of otherwise 'rational' father
- alliteration increases the pace and heightens the tension
- peace of understanding on each face
- happy it's not them
- somforted by seeing her suffer
- it was meant to happen, karma
16 of 23
NIGHT OF THE SCORPION (structure)
- enjambment
- disconcerting and discomforting for the reader
- shows flow of chatter and blur of incantations
- loss of control, helpless, nothing you can d
- long first stanza and short second stanza
- mother's simplicity and reason in spite of suffering
- villagers' neverending talk
- ironic that incantations, curses and blessings are futile
- gap may represent that it's only time that can heal
- length may show the long suffering of the ordeal.
17 of 23
VULTURES (language)
- drizzle of one despondent dawn
- alliteration of plosives, aggressive
- pathetic fallacy, hints at negtivity of poem
- semantic field of death and gloom
- cold/ telescopic eyes
- metallic, manmade evil
- weapon
- evil
- her face turned to the wall
- personifies love
- love exists in evil
- feelings of shame, disgust, ignorance towards evil
- Commandant v Daddy
- capitalisation links the tow, both are important
- colloquial term makes him seem friendly, ironic
- role in war and role as father, how war can change people (WW2)
18 of 23
- fumes of/ human roast clinging/ rebelliously to his hairy/nostrils
- feelings of disgust and horror
- vivid imagery
- evil stays with him and won't go away
- fumes hint at gassing of the Jews
- fumes have negative, unpleasant connotations
- chocolate
- sweetness contrasts with human roast
- ogre/ a tiny glow-worm/ tenderness
- happiness of love existing in evil
- metaphor glow-worm seems weak and insignificant in evil
- icy caverns
- coldness and evil can extinguish vulnerable flame
- despair v praise
- complexity
- should we be happy that love exists in evil or afraid that evil exists in love?
- suggests the two must coexist
19 of 23
VULTURES (structure)
- 4 stanzas
- love in evil (vultures)
- confusion and contemplation
- evil in love (Nazi officer)
- presents reader with perturbing ending, prompts reader to question themselves
- ends poem with evil
- resonates with the reader
- makes poem pessimistic
- makes the evil seem dominant
- ellipsis (...)
- convey confusion
- illustrate disjointed feelings of poet
- portray the overlap of love and evil
- slow the pace and prompt reader to contemplate
- isolation of strange
- epitomizes poets feelings of confusion
- illustrate complexity of human nature
20 of 23
WHAT WERE THEY LIKE? (language)
- light hearts turned to stone
- metaphor
- lifeless, culture lost warmth and happiness
- burden and damage of war
- poet's cold-hearted bitterness towards war
- sir
- repetition, perhaps mocking, poet doesn't agree that the person asking the questions is superior
- ironic, he should be intelligent, he should know the answers
- no more buds
- loss of life
- no more new life
- loss of beauty
- bones were charred
- horror and disgust
- severity of pain
- plosive conveys brutality
- vivid image, blackened, evil overcame goodness
21 of 23
- laughter is bitter to the burned mouth
- happiness turned to pain
- plosive alliteration, severity of suffering
- vivid image of pain
- short sentence suggests anger
- When bombs smashed those mirrors
- permanent damage
- 'smashed' hard, onomatopoeic sound
- short sentence, bitter, angry
- flight of moths in moonlight
- fragility, vulnerability
- gentle alliteration of 'm'
- Who can say?
- ambiguity
- contradicts simplicity and patronising nature of questions
- no memory of culture
- totally lost forever
22 of 23
WHAT WERE THEY LIKE? (structure)
- Questions and Answers
- difference in length
- doesn't wait for an answer, doesn't really care, only asks questions out of etiquette
- past tense of questions, culture has gone
- closed questions, simplicity, yes/no response, patronising
- longer answers, contradictory, there is more to the Vietnamese culture
- ambiguity of answers contrasts with simplicity of questions
- conveys complexity and intricacy of the culture
- makes it more difficult to read, reader feels the same discomfort and perhaps frustration
- perhaps conveys the difficult nature of the topic, how can you begin to discuss something so painful?
- division between questioner and answerer
- distance from present and past
23 of 23
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