Diverse poems and poetic traditions

T.S. Eliot, Lawrence Ferlinghetti, & Ezra Pound

"Preludes" by T.S. Eliot adopts a slant rhyme pattern to convey the state of his thoughts as he writes the poem. The poem basically illustrates the Voice/Poet's thoughts about the seemingly busy, yet tiresome and uninteresting lives of the people in the urban areas (cities). Eliot paints this tiresome and uninteresting picture of human life in the city by slant rhymes, reflecting the continuous stream of unorganized thoughts of the poet. For example, slant rhyming occurs in lines 2 and 4, where "passageways" and "smoky days" are used. However, towards the end of the poem, slant rhyming is instead replaced with end-rhymes (lines 12 and 13, with rhymes used "stamps" and "lamps"), proving once again the presence of 'unstable' and changing thoughts of the poet.

"The pennycandystore beyond the El" by Lawrence Ferlinghetti utilizes symbolism to effectively depict his thoughts about the fleeting nature of childhood, conveying feelings of nostalgia, regret, and hope in the poem. The pennycandystore used in the poem served as the symbol of childhood, where small desires such as craving for candies reflect the trivial yet happy nature of a child. The transition between childhood to adulthood is signified by the line, "A wind has blown away the sun." This line marks the emergence of adulthood, a stage in people's life where difficulties and disillusionment happens. However, Ferlinghetti tries to bring hope to all people through his poem, showing how we can still become children at heart once again, with the presence of the girl with 'breathless breasts' entering the pennycandystore. Thus, through the girl's character, childhood is both regretted and re-claimed, giving feelings (in this part of the poem) of regret and nostalgia to the readers.

"Epithalamium" by Louis Gluck expresses the poet's disillusionment about the sacred vow of marriage. Through the use of assonance, consonance, and alliteration, Gluck effectively expressed this disillusionment and sarcasm as the poet describes the process of marriage as it happens among couples in the real, disillusioned life. Assonance is evident in the first two stanzas of the poem, wherein repetition of similar vowel sounds is evident: "... so much pain in the world -- the formless grief of the body, whose language is hunger..." Consonance is adopted at the mid-part of the poem (stanzas 3 and 4) to depict the poet's intense feelings, signified by the use of consonant sounds stopped short after a series of 'breathing sounds.' As an example, Gluck shows how lines 10-12 utilizes breath sounds in phrases like "terrible charity" stopped immediately by "marriage," and the word "husband" immediately followed by a stoppage in the word "wife." Alliteration, lastly, is used at the end of the poem, aiming to show the readers feelings of love and hate, as well as regret and disillusionment in the line, "Here is my hand that will not harm you."

Ezra Pound's "The River-Merchant's Wife" uses parallelisms between the Wife's phases of transition in life and illustrations of agricultural life to depict her life as she struggles to a pre-destined life of being a wife to a river-merchant. There are three phases of transition in the poem, where important realizations in life were arrived at when the Wife was still aged fourteen, fifteen, and sixteen, successively. Phase 1, with Wife at age fourteen, depicts the phase wherein the Wife is at the denial stage, as she struggles to accept the reality that she is going to get married at an early age. This phase is appropriately illustrated by the presence of imagery of childhood innocence and playfulness with the presence of flowers, bamboo stilts, and blue plums. Phase 1, with Wife at age fourteen, depicts the phase wherein the Wife is at the denial stage, as she struggles to accept the reality that she is going to get married at an early age. This phase is appropriately illustrated by the presence of imagery of childhood innocence and playfulness with the presence of flowers, bamboo stilts, and blue plums. Phase 2 illustrates the transition from denial to adaptation, as the Wife is slowly trying to comprehend her reality, acting on it rather than denying it. This phase, which occurred when the Wife was fifteen, is paralleled with the image of dust, signifying that the Wife is willing to spend her life with her husband, despite any difficulties in life. The last phase, which happened when the Wife was sixteen, shows the image of Nature blooming, while the Wife is seemingly passing through the prime of her life, as she becomes to depend her life more on her marriage, gradually losing herself (identity) for her marriage.