Bearing Witness to Immorality: Poetry by Perpetrators and Victims of the Vietnam War Poetry from and about the Vietnam War is extensive and inexhaustible, with poems still being written about the Vietnam Memorial in Washington, DC, and the prolonged impacts of the war felt by the people of Vietnam. […]
Author Archive | Alice
i told my mother that i’m depressed
i told my mother that i’m depressed i told her that i was tired She cried Where was the Support? She cried dad has an ulcer i cant cry i don’t cry who is allowed to be depressed why is it never me sometimes i hate her usually i hate myself there is screaming downstairs […]
Memorializing Through Poetry
I am both captivated and at times confounded by Yusef Komunyakaa’s poem “Facing It.” For the most part, I am able to understand and feel myself sink into the poem and can wrap myself within its stunning and stilling imagery; however, towards the end on the poem, things became a little foggy and unclear for […]
Lee Bartett, You Almost Answered the Question “What is Language Poetry?”
In my perhaps idiotic attempt to grasp Language Poetry, I stumbled across an article that I (charmingly, foolishly) believed to be the key to my understanding. This delightful article titled “What is ‘Language Poetry’?” by Lee Bartlett tried and failed valiantly and perhaps ironically to explain this mystifying style of poetics. I looked through half […]
I can now mourn the dead
The Pardon (Spoiler, my paralyzed dog recovered!) Upon my first read through of “The Pardon” by Richard Wilbur, I was both moved and agonized. Last weekend, we put our family dog to sleep. Thirteen years ago, I found my first dog under a pine tree, paralyzed from botulism. If we read these poems as self-contained […]
Defying Oppressive Language Structure
In Lexi Rudnitsky’s article “The “Power” and “Sequelae” of Audre Lorde’s Syntactical Strategies,” Rudnitsky examines the importance Lorde placed not only on words and language but also the form and medium of language. Rudnitsky asserts that “Lorde privileged poetry over other forms of expression because she believed that poetry alone had the ability to create […]
Is Elm really this simple?
Something I most enjoy while reading Sylvia Plath’s poetry is the clear visual depictions of very abstract and intangible things such as grief, disassociation, and the overwhelming nature of thoughts. That being said, Plath does not write so clearly as to rid the work of all mystique or intrigue. “Elm” is a good example of […]
“The Problem of Anxiety” is its timlessness
The Problem of anxiety, as posed and described by John Ashbery in his thus-titled poem is not that anxiety does not stop you from living rather, it colors your life in ways that make living harder, bleaker, duller, hungrier even. There is an accurate sense of timelessness to anxiety that Ashbery captures within the […]
Born into this…
The pressure of life weighs upon us, Presses upon us— There is no relief from the expectations, From the “opportunities,” From the responsibilities. Each day I see people being swept away, Away from peace and contentment, Swept toward frustrations, Toward commitment, Into expectations, Commitments, Obligations, Into more and more work. We are born into this. […]