Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English
28 March 2011
Poetry Response #9 Second Semester
Sandra Beasley wrote her poem Let Me count the Waves as a sestina based upon a quote by Donald Revell, which reads, “we must not look for poetry in poems.” The last line in her first stanza echoes that sentiment, “and never look for poetry in poems.” This statement seems to warn the reader not to ever force a poetic meaning out of an enjoyable art form while simultaneously tempting one to do so. Her repeating line enders are “skirts,” “ducks,” “face,” “butt,” “home,” and “poems.” In addition to their initial ending positions and subsequent placement in the other stanzas, Beasley utilizes polyptoton in the opining stanza on five of the lines occasionally using a verb and noun form that have separate meanings completely (the word “skirt” as in dodge and “skirts” like the clothing item.)
The ridged structure of the sestina highlights the playfulness described in writing a poem and the outlandish suggestions (like monkeys in skirts) by juxtaposing the thesis of the poem which is ironically, “what is form? Turning art into artifice.” I was actually discussing the other day in Creative Writing about the pointe in which prose disappears and blank and free verse exist. And for various reasons when set with the task of writing a poem I concentrate immensely on structure and form, generally failing. Yet the poems I write that actually possess some semblance of balance and structures are ones that begin organically with a clever idea and are not written as an assignment. But they usually still contain some overarching or repeating rhyme concept or structural parallelism.
Monday, March 28, 2011
Monday, March 21, 2011
Villanelle Poetry Responce/I am to tierd to come up with a cleaver alternate title and won't even both to capitolize this one
Virginia Byde Pacetti
AP English IV
Mrs. Jernigan
21 March 2011
Poetry Response #2 Fourth Quarter
David Trinidad’s “Chatty Cathy Villanelle” is nostalgic in a way that shows the pithiness of childhood entertainment. Yet as a man wrote this villanelle about the classic doll, it most likely exists in a sarcastic since, possibly in response to a female relative’s incessant pleasure from the most annoying thing on the planet. Yet he juxtaposes the shallowness of lines about tea parties and pretending to play house with the repetition of the questions “When you grow up, what will you do?/I’m Chatty Cathy. Who are you?”. There is more brevity in such questions as every girl as she grows older contemplates who she is and how she fits into the world as she leaves the land of make believe behind.
I for one was never fond of talking dolls (they kind of creeped my mom out I think) and I felt kept me from total control over the stories my dolls entered. But I had a talking Build-a-Bear. Of course since my Build-a-Bear Panda was not nearly as famous or popular as Little Miss Chatty, when my friends say, “can you take me home?” And I interject, using my best ‘tour guide Barbie voice,’ “Please take me home; please pick me up,” which are Sony the Panda’s favorite phrases people often stare at me. Trinidad excels in imitating the annoying screechy sound of talking toys in the expressions of Chatty Cathy recalling memories that may bring a wave of glowing remembrance or compulsive irritation.
AP English IV
Mrs. Jernigan
21 March 2011
Poetry Response #2 Fourth Quarter
David Trinidad’s “Chatty Cathy Villanelle” is nostalgic in a way that shows the pithiness of childhood entertainment. Yet as a man wrote this villanelle about the classic doll, it most likely exists in a sarcastic since, possibly in response to a female relative’s incessant pleasure from the most annoying thing on the planet. Yet he juxtaposes the shallowness of lines about tea parties and pretending to play house with the repetition of the questions “When you grow up, what will you do?/I’m Chatty Cathy. Who are you?”. There is more brevity in such questions as every girl as she grows older contemplates who she is and how she fits into the world as she leaves the land of make believe behind.
I for one was never fond of talking dolls (they kind of creeped my mom out I think) and I felt kept me from total control over the stories my dolls entered. But I had a talking Build-a-Bear. Of course since my Build-a-Bear Panda was not nearly as famous or popular as Little Miss Chatty, when my friends say, “can you take me home?” And I interject, using my best ‘tour guide Barbie voice,’ “Please take me home; please pick me up,” which are Sony the Panda’s favorite phrases people often stare at me. Trinidad excels in imitating the annoying screechy sound of talking toys in the expressions of Chatty Cathy recalling memories that may bring a wave of glowing remembrance or compulsive irritation.
Monday, March 7, 2011
Poetry Responce #7/It is Kind of Weird that People in Romantic Relationships on Medical Drama's Call Each Other by their Last Names
Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
7 March 2011
Poetry Response #7
Anne Sexton wrote an ode entitled “In Celebration of My Uterus” praising the organ that represents her womanhood. Sexton divides the poem into four stanzas all of which are structured in a very different matter. The first stanza encompasses lines of varying length and five sentences (three of which have a clause begging with the anaphora “but.” Sexton conveys both her personal feelings about the event by using first person and addressing the uterus in second person, while still incorporating the third person doctors. The second stanza also has lines of different size, and the phrase “of the woman I am,” appears twice after praises given to the uterus. She shifts from the personal to the universal and external for the third person, third stanza, which has significantly more lines than the proceeding stanza of somewhat equal lines. It also has a predominate anaphora of “one is.” The last stanza harkens to the pattern of the second repeeting some of the same lines and yet emulates the third in its long list of “let me[s]” and “for[s].” Sexton only writes in third person for the last stanza.
She begins by personifying the uterus. She coddles it with her diction as if it were a child and she a proud mother. It seems that the antecedent occurrence to this poem involved a medical issue in which the doctors insisted she needed a hysterectomy to survive and yet she (or the uterus) proved them wrong. Her optimism seen in the triumph juxtaposed with the line “you are not torn,” which suggests how horrible the alternative to her decision was, relays her immense gratitude concerning avoiding the loss of the uterus. In the next stanza she presents her gratitude to her uterus by describing the “sweet weight,” which generally would be a point of complaint in women who take it for granted as an integral part of femininity. Then she relates the uterus in metaphors comparing it to a cup and to soil, showing how it’s chief purpose is to hold something and nurture said item that has laid its roots (a metaphor for a fetus). The third stanza concerns itself with sweeping generalizations such as, “each soul has a life,” and statements about “the harvest.” In relation to said harvest Sexton posits multiple situations of women doing exciting or basic activities all over the world where women are utilizing their uterus or glad of it. This of course promotes the earlier sentiment that the uterus ties the female anatomy and her ability to create life but also women as a collective as it is a defining characteristic. Sexton uses the last paragraph to explore what her purpose in life to help others or discover new things is, now that she has fortuitously defied death. This common reaction to healing furthers the gratitude she possesses and her willingness to fight no matter the obstacle posed to her.
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
7 March 2011
Poetry Response #7
Anne Sexton wrote an ode entitled “In Celebration of My Uterus” praising the organ that represents her womanhood. Sexton divides the poem into four stanzas all of which are structured in a very different matter. The first stanza encompasses lines of varying length and five sentences (three of which have a clause begging with the anaphora “but.” Sexton conveys both her personal feelings about the event by using first person and addressing the uterus in second person, while still incorporating the third person doctors. The second stanza also has lines of different size, and the phrase “of the woman I am,” appears twice after praises given to the uterus. She shifts from the personal to the universal and external for the third person, third stanza, which has significantly more lines than the proceeding stanza of somewhat equal lines. It also has a predominate anaphora of “one is.” The last stanza harkens to the pattern of the second repeeting some of the same lines and yet emulates the third in its long list of “let me[s]” and “for[s].” Sexton only writes in third person for the last stanza.
She begins by personifying the uterus. She coddles it with her diction as if it were a child and she a proud mother. It seems that the antecedent occurrence to this poem involved a medical issue in which the doctors insisted she needed a hysterectomy to survive and yet she (or the uterus) proved them wrong. Her optimism seen in the triumph juxtaposed with the line “you are not torn,” which suggests how horrible the alternative to her decision was, relays her immense gratitude concerning avoiding the loss of the uterus. In the next stanza she presents her gratitude to her uterus by describing the “sweet weight,” which generally would be a point of complaint in women who take it for granted as an integral part of femininity. Then she relates the uterus in metaphors comparing it to a cup and to soil, showing how it’s chief purpose is to hold something and nurture said item that has laid its roots (a metaphor for a fetus). The third stanza concerns itself with sweeping generalizations such as, “each soul has a life,” and statements about “the harvest.” In relation to said harvest Sexton posits multiple situations of women doing exciting or basic activities all over the world where women are utilizing their uterus or glad of it. This of course promotes the earlier sentiment that the uterus ties the female anatomy and her ability to create life but also women as a collective as it is a defining characteristic. Sexton uses the last paragraph to explore what her purpose in life to help others or discover new things is, now that she has fortuitously defied death. This common reaction to healing furthers the gratitude she possesses and her willingness to fight no matter the obstacle posed to her.
Monday, February 28, 2011
I Am Number 6 Poetry Responce/I Hope your Moving Went Well
Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
28 February 2011
Poetry Response #6
Hartley Coleridge’s poem “To a Deaf and Dumb Little Girl” is not necessarily addressed to a deaf and mute girl, but rather Coleridge comments on the seeming seclusion and isolation he would associate with such an affliction. He wrote this poem as a Petrarchan sonnet, with fourteen lines and a rhyme scheme ABBAACCADEEDFF. Like traditional sonnets most of the lines have 10 syllables, though lines ten and eleven have one and two extra respectively. Though the sonnet consists of only one stanza there exists a definite shift between line eight and nine.
The first octave deals with the separation and loneliness that comes from being an outsider and not being able to readily communicate with those around oneself. To demonstrate this side effect of not being able to hear or speak, Coleridge begins with a simile comparing the child to an island surrounded by a vast “fickle sea,” and highlighting the resulting “privacy.” He then discusses She can watch a dance but never listen to the music to explain that while she is privy to the visually beautiful aspects of life she will always remain oblivious to the auditory wonders. Such explicative and informative information presented at the beginning help to conjure sympathy from the reader for the unknown girl.
The concluding sextet draws attention to her actual actions and abilities. Coleridge describes “All her little being/Concentrated in her solitary seeing,” emphasizing the diminutive stage of life she is at and also the effort she must exert to understand the world. The poem then ends on a happy and understanding note as Coleridge writes he thinks, “God must be with her in her solitude.”
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
28 February 2011
Poetry Response #6
Hartley Coleridge’s poem “To a Deaf and Dumb Little Girl” is not necessarily addressed to a deaf and mute girl, but rather Coleridge comments on the seeming seclusion and isolation he would associate with such an affliction. He wrote this poem as a Petrarchan sonnet, with fourteen lines and a rhyme scheme ABBAACCADEEDFF. Like traditional sonnets most of the lines have 10 syllables, though lines ten and eleven have one and two extra respectively. Though the sonnet consists of only one stanza there exists a definite shift between line eight and nine.
The first octave deals with the separation and loneliness that comes from being an outsider and not being able to readily communicate with those around oneself. To demonstrate this side effect of not being able to hear or speak, Coleridge begins with a simile comparing the child to an island surrounded by a vast “fickle sea,” and highlighting the resulting “privacy.” He then discusses She can watch a dance but never listen to the music to explain that while she is privy to the visually beautiful aspects of life she will always remain oblivious to the auditory wonders. Such explicative and informative information presented at the beginning help to conjure sympathy from the reader for the unknown girl.
The concluding sextet draws attention to her actual actions and abilities. Coleridge describes “All her little being/Concentrated in her solitary seeing,” emphasizing the diminutive stage of life she is at and also the effort she must exert to understand the world. The poem then ends on a happy and understanding note as Coleridge writes he thinks, “God must be with her in her solitude.”
Wednesday, February 23, 2011
At least I Finnished It/Poetry Responce
Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
23 February 2011
Poetry Response #5 (I think) of semester 2
William Shakespeare’s sonnet “Shall I Compare Thee to a summer’s Day?” is written as a loving and complementary metaphor. Though it appears that he might be speaking to a lover, he is actually addressing a mentee. Therefore, in this case the structure of a sonnet may have indeed hindered his attempts to convey his feelings. Having such a specific fixed form limits the variability of expression. This means that for meters sake lines such as “So long as men can breathe or eyes can see,” relates a false since of sexual longing. And the line, “And often is his gold complexion dimmed,” highlights such physical attraction, yet the line is necessary and stagnate because it must have ten syllables and rhyme with the line at the stanzas end which ends with “untrimmed.” Although one might never realize William Shakespeare was writing about a person at all, if the reader skipped the first line, because the rest of the poem just extends the description of a pleasant summer day, without again drawing reference to the person he wished to immortalize in his work.
“Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer’s Day” is a traditional English sonnet. Shakespeare wrote many more of them, so many that they are also referred to as Shakespearian sonnets. The entire poem is in iambic pentameter, and because of that strict regulation, a few of his words are abbreviated to fit the meter. Yet even when he shortened the word owest to “ow’st” to fit the meter, he made sure to rhyme it with a perfect rhyming word “grow’st” in order to obey the rhyme scheme ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
Monday, February 7, 2011
Poetry Responce #3 for the 3rd Quarter/I'm Presently Lamenting the Lack of Snow
Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
7 February 2011
Poetry Response #3-Second Semester
Moira Egan wrote a dramatic monologue entitled “Dear Mr. Merrill.” The speaker currently resides in Olympia, Greece, although by her language, need to clarify her location, and admission of newly exploring staple art pieces of the city, it seems she permanently resides, or at the very least hails from somewhere else, possibly the states. Egan leads me to believe the woman is most likely an art professor, and of middle age. The poem is addressed as a letter to Mr. Merrill, a man who has also observed art in Olympia. She first apologizes for the “informality of this letter.” And to some extent this clarification indeed implies to the letter, if examined from a purely poetic standpoint. The poet herself may be apologizing to the reader. While there are five stanzas each compromised of six lines each, the structure becomes more lax from there. The writer makes no attempt at an overall common rhythm or syllabic parallelism. A common rhyme scheme shell of ABABCC only comes to full fruition in stanza four. Elsewhere inexact appears: “lines” with “shine,” “pomegranate’s” with “sonnet,” and “him” with “him.” Other times the speaker abandons rhyming altogether.
The most common feature in this story would be the allusions, most of which are Greek in origin and relate to the reader a sense of unfulfilled sexual passion. She cites her desire to render a statue of Hermes holding grapes (a symbol of pampering and sometimes of bondage of the one holding the fruit) into her own Pygmalion statue (Pygmalion carved a statue of a perfect woman and then married it turning it to life). And later after expanding greatly on the promiscuous dreams that revolved one of her students, she references a pomegranate, the fruit Persephone ate after being taken to the Underworld against her will to serve as Hades’ Queen. Yet, despite what I might consider bleakness for her love life on the horizon, the story lacks actual evidence to any real love life, she finishes the poem positively: “Love held tight in a sonnet.”
Sunday, February 6, 2011
My Glog on Agamemnon from The Oresteia
Note: The top film clip is of the opening to Macbeth and the lowest left passege requires scrolling.
http://pleah.glogster.com/glog-1649/
http://pleah.glogster.com/glog-1649/
Monday, January 31, 2011
Poetry Responce #2 for the 3rd Quarter/I can not Belive I Actuly Figured Out How to Post Something
Virginia Byde Pacetti
Mrs. Jernigan
AP English IV
31 January 2011
Third Quarter Poetry Response #2
Poet Edgar Lee Masters’ writes as the apparently now dead Dora Williams, in the aptly named dramatic monolog, Dora Williams. Dora retells her life in less than twenty-five lines, starting as a late teenager or young adult and proceeding forward, which simply entails reciting a list of all her boyfriends and husbands, as well as the places she moved to with one or after a one’s death or brake-up. Dora, who dies a Countess presumably poisoned by her Count, speaks bluntly, sardonically, and pompously to anyone who might hear her from beyond the grave. Or maybe she just calls out to the sea who inscribed “Contessa Naigato/ Implora eternal quiete” on her head stone. This translates to “Countess Navigato/begs for eternal peace” in Italian, one of the four languages she can speak upon her death. Such an epitaph, with deepness in sharp contrast to the rest of the story told in a rather pedestrian air, suggests that after three attempts at gold digging, and two more even less successful relationships (which she clearly wishes to push to the back of her mind as she glosses over the saying no more than, “[he] ran away and threw me,” and characterizes the other only as “villain”) she would rather let the quest for men be and rest.
She moved from Springfield to Rome making the logical steps between from Chicago to the more prestigious and pretentious New York and more elitist Paris as a woman “insidious, subtle, [and] versed” as her fortune grew. In Paris the reader becomes aware that her money accumulated from her two prior marriages is quite the little fortune. Both men, extremely affluent, she disliked one as life with one was “wretched” and the other an old man infatuated with her, who’s death grossed her out, and easily garnered her profit that nearly caused “a scandal.” Context clues such as the scandal and the line “he was mad about me—so another fortune” most likely imply she came into money life-long family members may have been entitled to. She tricked her first husband into marriage as he was drunk at the time, yet she was only grateful when it was over. This fortune provided what it seems she was always searching for, the bigger and better: hobnobbing with nobles and the artist crowd.
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