compacing Facing it and Dulce et Decorum

“Facing it” by Yusef Komunyakaa and “Dulce et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen, are two powerful poems with the graphical life like images on the reality of war. It is apparent that the authors was a soldier who experienced some of the most gruesome images of World War I. In “Ducle et Decorum Est” Owen tells us about a personal experience in which he survived a chemical warfare attack. Although he survives, some of his fellow troops do not. As in “Facing It” Komunyakaa is also a soldier who has survived a war. Komunyakaa response to his war experience is deeply shaped by his visit to Lin’s memorial. Inspired by the monument, Komunyakaa confronts his conflicted feelings about Vietnam, its legacy, and even more broadly, the part race plays in America. Both author used imagery and symbolism as they wrote these poems. Owens describes the soldiers as being crippled, mentally and physically overcome by the weight of their experiences in the war. He compares the young men to “old beggars under sacks”, saying that war turns young men with a full life ahead of them, and optimistic views into beggars that have given up on life and believe that life is never going to get any better (lines 1 and 2). The imagery that he uses allows us to see how gruesome the war really was, and how it was not just something that was glorious and honorable. In the second stanza Owens continues to use similes to show imagery, while ecstasy usually means, an excessive amount of happiness, here it is used to describe how young me are shocked into trying to run for their lives from “Gas! (line1). As where Komunyakaa describes himself as a black person that hides in the darkness of that granite (line 1 and 2). Komuyakaa stands at the memorial realizing that is more that it appears; it is not just cold stone, but something he identifies with on a more deep and profound level. It is this deeper meaning that inspires his emotional response in lines 3-5. These Loading...Manning Page 3 lines show both his