Preview

Mid Term Break Poetry Analysi

Good Essays
Open Document
Open Document
829 Words
Grammar
Grammar
Plagiarism
Plagiarism
Writing
Writing
Score
Score
Mid Term Break Poetry Analysi
The poem ‘Mid- Term Break’ describes the phenomenal loss that a family is suffering from the death of a child and brother. It is written from a young boy’s perspective as it continues to inform the audience of the grieve suffering that the family is currently enduring. It focuses on the feelings of the family and the funeral being the first time that the young boy has seen his brother since a car accident.
The structure of the poem ‘Mid-Term Break’ positions its audiences in a specific way throughout the use of structure. The following poem includes 8 stanzas each 3 sentences long. However, towards the end of the poem standing alone is the last stanza, it includes only 1 sentence. This was separated from the rest of the text to emphasize the ending of the poem as it is possibly the most important line. It reinforces the devastation of the event that has occurred whilst highlighting the impact that the death has had on the family. Additionally, each stanza has only 2 sentence most. This allows the author to move time quickly. This is important within the poem as it often changes scenery quite quickly and due to the stanza’s being short, this allows the author to do so. It is clear that the poem has a slight lack of punctuation as the sentence structure is incorrect. Each doesn’t end with a full stop although, starts with a capital letter. This demonstrates that the boy may not have learnt much punctuation whilst at the same time gives its audience an insight into the young age of the boy. The overall tone of the poem is sombre and depressing. Although we are soothed throughout mid way of the poem through Heaney’s use of language, the majority of the poem is filled with deep sadness due to the life of the infant that is cut short. Moreover, the title of the poem is slightly confusing as it suggests a ‘break’ meaning holidays or happiness however; reading the poem it contradicts in the fact that this ‘break’ was not filled with happiness or joy. Throughout the

You May Also Find These Documents Helpful

  • Better Essays

    Poetry Analysis Essay

    • 1149 Words
    • 5 Pages

    Poetry arouses great emotions in people. How have four poems “aroused emotions” in you? What have you learnt about war and the emotions associated with it?…

    • 1149 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Better Essays
  • Good Essays

    In the last two stanzas’ it is revealed at last what has happened to her family. The reader can feel the pain and sorrow that the girl goes through and the sad disappointment at not…

    • 559 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    During the poem, the father cannot remember a new story to tell his son. With this, the father starts to think of the upsetting idea that his son will be “packing his shirts…” and leaving. The father then yells and tries to give an explanation for his quietness. This reaction shows the father’s fear of his son leaving and losing him to time. The father’s view of his son leaving involves a plea to tell him one more story and to not leave. This contrast of the father, a man that forgot a new story and the parent in love with his child, makes for a better understanding of the deep relationship the father has with his…

    • 419 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Satisfactory Essays

    Real Cool Poem

    • 512 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The speaker starts by telling the waves to "break, break, break" onto the rocks. He then says that his "tongue" cannot "utter" the thoughts that are within him. The narrator is not thinking very much; the thoughts "arise in" him naturally without any form of effort. The speaker thinks that it is good that the fisherman's kids are yelling and playing with each other. The speaker says it is good that the sailor is singing in his boat. Due to the sad mood of the poem the speaker seems jealous. The speaker sees great ships pass by and go to their port under a hill. There must be a hill over the shore. The speaker doesn’t seem distracted by the ships, because he just keeps on speaking. The speaker wishes he could touch some ones "vanish'd hand" and hear their voice again. I think the speaker is talking about a dead loved one. The speaker talks to the waves again and tells them to “Break, break, break,” but this time the waves break on the crags instead of the rocks; the…

    • 512 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Satisfactory Essays
  • Good Essays

    Midterm Break Analysis

    • 694 Words
    • 3 Pages

    "Midterm Break" is a happy, promising title that belies the experience of the narrator; the irony of a death in the family over midterm has robbed not only Heaney's joy in family nostalgia, but all his horror and grief as well. The ideas of death, grief, and finality are explored in this poem. As he encounters other mourners, each more intense than the next, his neighbors, his crying father, Jim Evans, an emotionally ravaged family friend. His tone takes on an aura of dismay. Heaney retreats emotionally at their hollow comforts.…

    • 694 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The reader is unsure at first just what might unfold, after all, the title suggests that this might be a poem about a holiday, a chance to get away from school work and relax. Instead, we're gradually taken into the grieving world of the first-person speaker, and the seriousness of the situation soon becomes clear. Heaney uses his special insights to reveal an emotional scene - remember this was the patriarchal Ireland of the 1950s - one in which grown men cry and others find it hard to take. The last line is full of pathos, the four-foot box measuring out the life of the victim in years.…

    • 684 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Firstly, Ben Jonson titles his poem ‘On my first sonne’, which is quite vague and only implies that the poem is about Ben Jonson’s first son. Whereas ‘Mid-Term Break’ suggests a holiday but this “break” does not happen for pleasant reasons. Jonson start his poem with ‘Farewell, thou child’ which seems as if he is talking to his son and he assumes that the boy can hear his words. In comparison, Seamus Heaney’s poem starts with ‘I sat all morning in a college sick bay Counting bells knelling classes to close.’ This implies that Heaney was in school or college at the time of his brother’s death and also seems that Heaney was bored as he was ‘counting bells’, but the word ‘knelling’ suggests a funeral bell rather than a school bell.…

    • 1236 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The structural layout in this poem suggests that a progression of ideas is taking place. The poem is divided into two stanzas; the first stanza indicates struggle and conflict, while the second stanza, on the other hand, indicates despair and is relatively smaller than the first stanza. The purpose of this is to show how big the burden of guilt the narrator is carrying around.…

    • 670 Words
    • 2 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    A tattoo is like poetry, because there is always more to the story than what meets the eye! The sonnet “First Poem for You” by Kim Addonizio is a riveting piece of poetry that uses symbolization to help guide the readers to understand the emotions and feelings the woman has towards her partner. Visual and tactile imagery used within this poem helps readers interpret the meaning of the poem. The theme is longevity and the true meaning of a relationship. In Addonizio “First Poem for You,” Addonizio utilizes literary elements to develop the story and detail a fictional character that is in love with a man that has permanent tattoos. Upon analyzing the symbols, visual imagery and theme throughout this poem the readers will better comprehend the poem to its entirety; these elements symbolize permanence, which is the meaning of the entire poem.…

    • 575 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    MacCaig starts off the poem by using different types of structure, including enjambment, repetition and word order, to deepen the reader’s understanding of this emotion, loss. MacCaig starts off by commenting on the visitor trying to keep his composure in the hospital, just before he goes to visit this ill patient for potentially the last time.…

    • 1062 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Poetry: Poem Analysis

    • 1089 Words
    • 5 Pages

    The works we studied within Creative Writing were all helpful in creating my own works to submit to the class. Throughout all of the reading, many of the works inspired me in different ways, whether it was short story plot ideas or word usage in the poems. While crafting my work for the final portfolio, I reviewed many of the poems from our poetry packet in an effort to find inspiration and to create new interesting images. I took the most inspiration for my formal poem, which I found most difficult to write. One of the poems that was most useful to me was Jilly Dybka’s “Memphis, 1976.” Dybka’s poem follows the sestina form; I also wrote my last poem in this form, so it helped to follow the form by looking at her poem as an example. Dybka’s…

    • 1089 Words
    • 5 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Poem Analysis Essay

    • 834 Words
    • 3 Pages

    The poem is about daylight saving time. Daylight Saving Time (DST) is an age-old practice where people would advance time by one hour to extend daylight time into the night. In effect, they would sacrifice sunrise time, also by one hour. People in the regions affected would adjust their clocks around the start of spring. They would change them back to normal time when summer ends. This practice has its root in early societies before the invention of the modern clock. Because most societies were agrarian at the time, and farm work was majorly dependent on daylight, people would plan their day and adjust their time according the length of daylight. Where daylight extended into the night, people would adjust their clocks to accommodate the new timeline, which, in this case, will also continue well into the night.…

    • 834 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Speaker for the Dead Poems

    • 1281 Words
    • 6 Pages

    In this poem I tried to portray the sadness Ender was feeling to leave his life but also the sense of duty he felt to the hive queen. I used Stanza break to highlight those feelings separately. I used imagery in describing Trondheim so that the reader could get a sense of what he is leaving.…

    • 1281 Words
    • 6 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    The story, written in the form of a letter, shows the process of a thirteen-year-old girl becoming more mature as she expresses her grievances from her tragic childhood. At the beginning of the story, she described both the emotional and physical difficulties her family suffered through because of the absence of her father. She felt lonely, insecure and confused as she hoped that her father would come back. “Sometimes I had bad dreams. I would dream the welfare took us away and no one missed us, not even mommy. Daddy where were you?” (Page 163) At the end of the letter, however, the girl started to understand that her view of the world before was unbalanced and incomplete, “through a thin veil full of small holes”. (Page 165) She felt more released and started to notice “the greatness of the world”. (Page 165) She began to treasure all the memories she had with her family instead of thinking about her misery all the time, “we carried on living.” (Page 165) There was a great transition of her character from the beginning to the end of the letter.…

    • 655 Words
    • 3 Pages
    Good Essays
  • Good Essays

    Mid-Term Break Essay

    • 1680 Words
    • 7 Pages

    The second section of 'Mid-Term Break' is the largest, and lasts from stanza two to stanza five. This section is also the darkest and most vibrant in imagery of the poem. The second section talks about the boy being greeted by a house full of strangers after the death of his younger brother, and the different ways each of his family members are handling the situation. The tone changes from section one to a deeper, more sad feel, as the writer is describing things like the main characters father crying, and old men offering their condolences to a child. Stanzas two, three and four develop the storyline in the form of the writer leading the reader through the house, as the main character is made uneasy by things like his father crying, the baby laughing in the pram, and people whispering about him. Stanza five is where the poem begins to explain the tragedy, through the last two lines "at ten o'clock the ambulance arrived, with the corpse, stanched and bandaged by the nurses."…

    • 1680 Words
    • 7 Pages
    Good Essays