This Room and Everything in It

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hcAeCqCAwpo

This was undoubtedly a love poem and Lee said it was about his wife. I think it could be presumed that is their first time and is basically what this poem is centered around. It includes his memories all the way to his childhood and what his farther taught him about memory. “Your sunken belly is the daily cup of milk I drank as a boy before Morning Prayer.” I felt that this poem expressed the fear of gratefulness of love. This room that he describes will be the place that he goes to in his memory to remember this special moment in time. “Ill close my eyes and recall this room and everything in it:” His descriptions are incredible to where you felt like you were there. “Your scent, that scent of spice and a wound, I’ll let stand for mystery. It’s like time has paused in the poem with every descriptions and little detail you would think he was looking at a picture afterwards because it would take some time to realize particular things like the book on the windowsill. “The book on the windowsill, riffled by wind the even numbered pages are the past, the odd-numbered pages, the future. The sun is God, your body is milk. I think this poem because even more special since they eventually married.

Persimmons

This poem was particularly confusing I couldn’t find real connection. The symbolism with the persimmon basically was something that gave you that good feeling or a bad feeling. Obviously it is some sort of fruit but when the persimmon is brought up it represents a particular time to remember in a way. At first the persimmon is a hassle because he couldn’t quite figure out the difference between that that precision. “In sixth grade Mrs. Walker slapped the back of my head and made me stand in the corner for not knowing the difference between persimmon and precision.” I looked up what a persimmon: An edible fruit that resembles a large tomato and has very sweet flesh. The descriptions were very detailed by describing how to eat the persimmon. “How to eat: put the knife away, law down newspaper. Peel the skin tenderly, not to tear the meat. Chew the skin, suck it, and swallow. Now, eat the meat of the fruit, so sweet, all of it, to the heart.” Again, I couldn’t quite grasp the underlying meaning of this poem but it had a very nice flow. The only really connection I found was maybe the precision in finding the perfect persimmon.

Sexy

Wow! I loved this story! The title really explains it all. I found it rather a coincidence that her friend's cousin's husband had an affair, but then there was Miranda participating in an affair with some lady's husband, Dev. Hypocrite?.. Maybe. I really liked the relationship between Dev and Miranda but the whole time the fact that he had a wife lingered in the back of my mind. He treated Miranda so well. "Dev was the first always to pay for things, and how doors open, and reach across a table in a restaurant to kiss her hand." He seems like a true gentleman until you realize well he has a wife already so now he becomes a scumbag. I think Miranda starts to realize that she wants to be with someone she can tell other people about. “Miranda began to wish that there was a picture of her and Dev tacked to the inside of her cubicle, like the one of Laxmi and her husband in front of the Taj Mahal.” Miranda was basically living the life with Dev with all of there excursions and they seemed to get a long so well. You can sense the sexual attraction between Dev and Miranda but at the end of the day she is just #2. I think Miranda feeds into Dev’s lines because he called her sexy, and this made Miranda feel empowered in a way. When Miranda went to a great deal of effort to get a few sexy things to wear, Dev didn’t even notice what she was wearing when he came over. Miranda ultimately creates an imaginary relationship with him that occurs only on Sundays, but she seems him as perfect. Finally when the young boy Robhin tells her she is sexy she then realizes what Dev and her have going on is wrong but she still longs for him. In the end I was quite disappointed when she said she would see him again but then as time went on they couldn’t make it work to meet and I think finally she could move on.

Walker

The relationship between Mama and her daughters kind of disgusted me in the fact that she didn't take pride in either of them. This isn’t the typical relationship that you see with a mother and a daughter. Instead of taking pride in her children and lifting them up she kind of just stood by feeling threatened or put out. "She used to read to us without pity; forcing words, lies, other folks’ habits, whole lives upon us two, sitting trapped and ignorant underneath her voice. She washed us in a river of make-believe, burned us with a lot of knowledge we didn’t necessarily need to know." This quote pretty much sums up how Mama felt about Dee and her getting an education. It made Mama feel inferior and instead of a sense of pride in Dee it was seen as sort of a threat. Most parents want the children to go off and succeed because they may not have had the opportunity but Mama is ultimately upset because she didn't get the chance. Then on the other hand with Maggie she is seen as sort a burden but she's isn't as threatened by her like Dee. You get a sense that Mama likes Maggie over Dee because Maggie is faithful and isn't selfish like Dee. "Have you ever seen a lame animal, perhaps a dog run over by some careless person rich enough to own a car, sidle up to someone who is ignorant enough to be kind to him? This is the way my Maggie walks. . . . She knows she is not bright. Like good looks and money, quickness passes her by." Mama clearly doesn’t have much respect for Dee after reading this quote comparing her to an animal and a dumb one at that. I really don’t think Mama gives credit to her daughters as they deserve.

Long Day's Journey into Night

The number of pages was overwhelming to look at but I thought the story was an easy read. It was a very interesting story overall because there was a lot of turmoil and drama with Mary who is addicted to Morphine was sent to a sanatorium for treatment. This ultimately doesn’t help her though to the disappointment to her family. Then Edmund has tuberculosis, so this family has gone through a lot in a short amount of time.

The main theme throughout the story was this family not being able to let go of the past or to accept their problems and to confront them. Mary addiction is mainly because of Jamie's stinginess and his unwillingness to pay for proper care. Most of these arguments continue throughout the play. This story is about the Throne family slowly deteriorating over the years. There is also a theme of alcoholism that is displayed, and after I did some research on the background of O’Neil I found out that the character Edmund was suppose to be him. His mother was a morphine addict like Mary as well. O’Neil even had an older brother that died in infancy and so did Edmund. There are many parallels between this story and O’Neil’s life.

Tyrone: Yes, this time you can see how strong and sure of herself she is. She’s a different woman entirely than other times. She has control of her nerves or she had until Edmund got sick. Now you can feel her growing tense and frightened underneath. I wish to God we could keep the truth from her, but we can’t if he has to be sent to a sanatorium. What makes it worse is her father died of consumption. I thought this summed up the whole story, by how Mary still had her morphine problem and there was undoubtedly an alcohol problem circling the family. This shows how lies were told in order to make things not seem as bad as they were but in the end it became a never ending cycle.

If We Must Die

In “If We Must Die,” the narrator describes himself and the rest of his military crew as hogs. I couldn’t pick out a direct distinction of which branch of military they were. “Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot” This ultimately represents feeling hunted like animals and trapped with no escape.” There hasn’t been an attack yet but they sit waiting and continue to be preyed on like hogs.

You can gather the assumption that this is taking place in a war because of the tone of the poem with this undying commitment. “If we must die, O let us nobly die, so that our precious blood may not be shed.” Basically this states that if they were to die at least they would die heroes. “In Vain; then even the monsters we defy shall be constrained to honor us though dead!” Even though the men are terribly threatened by the attackers they won’t back down and in the end they will have to commend them on such bravery and persistence.

“Though far outnumbered let us show us brave, and for their thousand blows deal one dealthblow!” Here you can really feel the encouragement that even though they are greatly outnumbered and have been hit far more they will come after the enemy with one blow and take them down. Throughout the poem there is just a lot spirit and courage with an undying sense of commitment for whatever it is they are fighting for. It’s almost like taking that last bit of energy that you have left and giving it all you’ve got. The narrator states that all that is left in front of him is either death or triumph. He has accepted this and insists on pushing forward, but this time they are men fighting back and are not the hogs that they were in the beginning scared of what might happen next. Even thought they will surely die, they won’t die without a fight.

The Lynching

With a title like “The Lynching” you wouldn’t presume it would be a joyous poem and when you continue to read it most definitely is not. This poem includes the cultural differences and commonalities with the impact of an historical event in which is greatly schocking. The opening line of “His spirit in smoke ascended to the high heave,” states that as he was being burned his spirit left his body during the cruel act of punishment.

For the time period lynching was very common place.  You can see that it isn’t out of the ordinary from this quote: “ The women thronged to look, but never a one showed sorrow in her eyes of steely blue.” Women just stood there in the mob of people and didn’t have an ounce of sympathy for the man hanging from the tree.  It continues: “ And the little lads, lynchers that were to be, danced round the dreadful thing in fiendish glee.” This quote depicts someone be hung and it hardly even phases the children because they see this probably every day of their lives. They too would grow up to become lynchers.

I’ve seen pictures of the lynchings in my history class and couldn’t believe that there was literally no expression on the viewers faces almost as if they are going to watch a show and nothing was wrong. We hear stories about what it was like to live in those days but have it put in front of you really takes you back in time to a place of inhumanity.