"Valentine" and "The Albatross"

“Valentine” by Carol Ann Duffy and “The Albatross” by Kate Bass , in these two poems I felt like they were similar in a way were they were both expecting to get love out of their loved ones but in their back of their heads they knew that would never happen and showed the consequences. In “Valentine,” the love that he is promising to her is a love that will never be shown, as she describes that the moon will soon be covered. This spoke to me as if he was being sarcastic that he will prove to her his love. Yet on the other hand, “The Albatross,” the poet feels as if when her husband comes home that he would at least take the time to acknowledge the effort she had put in to dress up. “When I know you are coming home I put on this necklace: Glass beads on a silken thread, a blue that used to match my eyes.” (KateBass28) The details she puts in to describe the color of the beads is a significance to me that he never paid any attention to her.

                The poet in “Valetine,” says, “Here. It will blind you with tears like a lover. It will make your reflection a wobbling photo of grief.”  You will never know how much i cared and loved you till you sit back and realize what you had, is what I am getting out of this. The refection photo of grief makes me feel like it is her way of expressing that he will be sorry! The same with “The Albatross,” she says, “I sit amongst toys and unwashed clothes…she fingers the beads until you speak in a voice that no longer seems familiar, only strange.” (KateBass28) if he was home as much as he should be, then his child would not be unfamiliar with his voice. “I turn as our child tugs at the string; I hear a snap and a sound like falling rain.” (KateBass28) His child is obviously unfamiliar with him so therefore the baby gets scared and pulls off her mother’s necklace as a sign. The love that a father will need to give his child and wife should always be there, but the love that the poet is seeking for is no longer there.

                 She imagines and hallucinates the reactions she would want to see and hear from him. “Valentine,” although its tough love that is being described she is saying it is no longer “..A cute card or kissogram.” (CarolAnnDuffy141). She yet gives him an onion as a significance that she no longer will put an effort to a thoughtful gift. But describes it as a fierce kiss, a passionate intimate kiss that will stay with him forever and will always remember it. “Possessive and faithful as we are, for as long as we are.” (CarolAnnDuffy141). For as long as we are, they are married and for their marriage she will keep reminding him her faithfulness and love towards him and tells him to take it “its scent will cling to your fingers, cling to your knife.” (CarolAnnDuffy141).

POPULAR MECHANICS

Popular Mechanics got me a little confused due to the fact that I could not figure out what the poet, Edward Nobles, was trying to say. It was not until I read it over three more times to understand what he was trying to explain. Although he was giving specific details, I could not get a hold of what this poem was about.

At first, the description he was giving was making it seem like Edward was just having deep thoughts within himself. Almost as if there was nothing else to do and was just bored. The description I got from him was that he was on the floor, really low to see under the dresser just enough to where he could see his own magazines. When a person is bored they have the tendency to find anything in the room interesting or anywhere that they are at. As he looks at the floor he notices the measure and length of the floor board, they are exact.

He describes seeing “The small clouds of dust accumulate beneath the bed.” (EdwardNobles121) Collecting dust bunnies is what he sees. He is viewing things as observational, visual phenomenal and does not think much about it. Yet as he gets into more details of removing undergarments, I quote got sidetracked because I was not expecting to get this out of this poem. “I pull her panties to the floor…the cloth is blue-I remember it-white cotton on the inner pouch.” (EdwardNobles121) At this point I get the idea that he may not be bored after all, but may be having some kind of intimacy with a woman.

I was not sure what he was trying to tell us, all the descriptions that were being given further into the poem like, “The elastic band contorts and expands. The cloth is soft.” (EdwardNobles12) Maybe I was not paying much attention to what he was trying to get across but I wondered if that was a description of her underwear as well or was It just something he was imagining in his head or these thoughts of words were running through his mind.   At the end of the poem it comes clearer and I was able to understand that he is in the middle of intercourse, “I hold tight, then begin to slide-slowly, not moving, up-ward, outward, into space.” (EdwardNobles122). Because he is being intimacy and passionate in that kind of moment, most people remember things and pay closer of attention to the things around them, almost as if there was a sudden stop in time, they are able to give specific details because of this.

I understood that part of the poem, but it lost me again at the very last paragraph. “I hesitate a few years at an iron leg, then move on, wondering at the blackness, the exactness of the measured line.” (EdwardNobles122).  It just all went from giving me an the idea of intimacy which was happening in real life to maybe just imagining it all in his head. My thoughts to this was, what if he did get bored and was just staring while lying on the floor and gave himself this imagery of intimacy and passionate in his mind. Sometimes the mind can wonder off on its own and it has the power to create these thoughts making one feel like they are In the moment.

"Slowy" > "Painting a Room"

The poem “Slowly” by Donna Masini and “Painting a Room” by Katie Kapovich are the poems I chose to write about. In the poem “Slowly” as a child in the fourth grade, she took a trip to the Zoo and was describing what she was seeing behind a glass. She had seen a rabbit being swallowed by a snake as she stood in front of this reptile. Donna describes, “..its head clenched in the wide jaws of the snake, the snake sucking it down its long throat.” (DonnaMasini138)  The watching of this, is a real life lesson to her she made it seem like. She is slowly taking it in to what it is that she is witnessing which is the loss of the rabbit’s life; therefor she is comparing it to what the losses she has lost such as loved ones. As you get older you understand that you cannot simply control what happens in life.

There is absolutely things in life that will grab you out of nowhere whether you like it or not, and it will take over and you will no longer have control of it, As well, she observed the way this snake swallowed the rabbit, she knows there is absolute no way this poor innocent animal would ever see the light ever again. Such as her past, the past stays behind and is never to be brought back up. She takes what was once done and lost in her past as the snake swallows the rabbit all as a whole. There is no stopping to what is chosen to happen in life, you just go with it. “I didn’t know why the snake didn’t choke, the rabbit never moved…sucking it down, just so I am taking this in, slowly.” (DonnaMasini139) For the loss of the Rabbit she is coping with her losses as well.

“Painting a Room” She is in the process of moving. But there are things that are drawing her back that is making her shed tears. The effort and changes she has made to the apartment she has been living in, no longer matter, she is moving countries. With a visa being expired, her time is up in the country she is recently in and is unable to do anything about this. As she shits back she acknowledges the turquoise frame and takes a look at the “Ten years of fears, unrequited loves, odd jobs, of night phone calls.” (KatieKapovich112) she is comparing that as if it was time being wasted there by doing all that or revolving her time as she was there for the past ten years.

Yet again she could not go back and change the time that was being wasted or done in the past just like Donna. What happened was already done, lessons were learned and regrets were made. In the case of these poems they are both reflecting off from the decisions they made that they are now regretting in the future. The last night Katie spends in her apartment she describes it as a “Freedom smells of a freshly painted room…” (KatieKapovich113) meaning after that night, she will no longer be able to live as she used to. Her visa expiration was taking hold of her changes being made in her life from now on.

Leanne O'Sullivan

 

            The poem “Waiting for My Clothes” by Leanne O’Sullivan, makes me wonder what is the actual reason she is there. The doctors are detaining her from all her belongings but yet they never actually tell her the purpose for the reasons they are doing this. The belongings that are being taken away are showing us or is describing that her books, clothes and music are obviously a part of her. But why is it that she is so possessive and worried that the doctors are removing these things? Is it that she has no one to talk as in friends? To my point of view she sees these things as company and feels empty without them.  And the only way to get these items back she explained was if she behaved in my understanding.

            As the doctors told her this, I came to think what the reason was to why she was not behaving. It seemed as if she had a mental disorder or was not behaving properly. The journal she spoke about was being described as if the doctors had removed her clothing, and from what I understood was like her life was in that journal.

            As her journal was being taken away she said, “taking my soul from between my ribs and leafing through the pages of my thoughts, as if they were reading my palms.” (o’sullivan17) Her privacy was being invaded by strangers. Her life was being read like an open book to others, the poem is being descried as “if they were reading palms.” (o’sullivan17) she had feelings as if these people saw her as something she was not.  Not recognizing who this person was, they were judging her. although she was being easily being judged, she did not reveal her true thoughts only left with questions being asked by others.

The Imaginary Replacement

  Being the oldest out of three girls has truly changed my opinion to why having an imaginary friends should be weird. When I was at the age of six I can truly recall my Little sister, she was at the age of four at the time, playing by her self as she sat calmly talking to mid air.I always felt the need to pass by her and say something mean or judge her for doing such a thing like that.

  I always had my mom around, from pre-k to elementary. She was always at my school field trips, there was not one trip she would be absent from. My mom was my best friend, therefor I really never felt the need to come up with an imaginary friend. All the attention I needed and wanted was always given to me by her. Although after a while the attention was not so much given to me anymore due to the fact that she went back to college to fulfill her dream of being a nurse. I was impatient and selfish of letting my best friend go, because I was so attached to my mom I felt the need to create a friend of my own. My friends' name was Liz; even though she was pretend, Liz kept me distracted for a while and kept my mind off of the betrayal that I felt on the inside.

  Even though I had my younger sister Meg to keep me company, she was to busy having her certain kind of fun with her imaginary friends, and yes friends, there was more than just one. I on the other hand was being entertained playing Tea Party and dollies. Dollies has always been a girly way of describing, playing barbies. Trying to have an imagination was very tough for me although I tried my best to try and get it in my head that Liz was my new best friend. As we played tea party, I sat at the end of a small coffee table my mom use to have in the middle of the living room and my imaginary friend would sit on the opposite end. I can literally recall telling Liz, "ok do not forget, pinky up!" and there we would both sit drinking our teas together. Playing dollies was a little different, when playing on your own it is still necessary to be the voice of your doll. But because Liz was fake she was not realistic I had to be her dolls voice as well, that was not fun at all.

  After a while of attempting to replace my mom with my imagination, I decided to go back to reality and recall all the good memories I spent and created with my mom. My child hood was very great I was a happy little girl with my mom always by my side that I necessarily did not need an imaginary figure to fulfill her spot. On the other hand my little sister was pretty much explanatory to why it is she created her friends. By the time my little sister was able to talk and walk my mom had already gone back to school so she did not have any one to keep her company nor did she have the full experience of my mom being in her child hood as much.

  Everyone has their own way of dealing situations differently, my solution was to create Liz. As a child we do not understand or fully know how to handle situations to losing your mom or a best friend, therefor I handled it in this kind of way. It was an awkward moment in my child hood to go through this phase but yet a memorable party of my life.



 
 

Best Friends

Living in a small neighborhood from the age of one to my teen years, i  became close to the new girl on the block. We were both at the age of ten when she moved four houses down from mine. One school day as the bus came around to pick us up for elementary, she got on first and I followed behind her. As she took her seat I sat right next to her and began talking to her trying to get to know this new girl. We came to find out we had many things in common and got a long real well, therefor we soon became best friends.

As soon as we got dropped off at home from the school bus, we would go straight inside the house and drop our back packs wherever we could and run to each others houses to play. We had no problem going back and forth to our houses for quiet a while, till one afternoon when it was her turn to come to my house I got a phone call from her and told me there was a huge black brown dog outside. This huge dog was a Rottweiler! The owner of this dog lived right in the middle of both of our houses, there was absolutely no way we could try and get pass this house we thought to our selves. I told her I would try and distract the dog and once the dog was not looking she would have to run as fast as she could to my house.

It became a routine for us to do when going to each others houses, it was easy and funny at the same time because even though we knew the dog was not realizing we were passing by, we would still have that mini heart attack and ran like it was behind us. Watching her do this every time was priceless because she ran very slow but tried so hard to run. Sooner or later the dog was not alone outside, the owner had gotten a Chihuahua as well.
Everyone knows those dogs are very loud and annoying and tend to bark for every little thing. Therefor we no longer were able to distract this big dumb Rottweiler. We still attempted to try and pass by the house and when we did the smaller dog would start to bark as soon as it seen us outside. once the barking started, the bigger dog would get up and just stare at us till we went back inside the house.

 The last thing we wanted to do was ask our moms to go drop us off because we knew that would be a ridiculous thing to do knowing we only lived four houses down! We had no choice but to ask but they insisted to just run that the dogs were not going to do anything to us, as I decided to listen to my mother I tried to not show fear and calmly attempted walking to her house, as I looked back I seen my mom holding a broom, typical Mexican. My mom knew these dogs were going to come after us, otherwise she would not have been outside holding her broom in her hand. Before you knew it my mother came running towards the dogs trying to scare them to let us get by. On the other hand my friends mom was handling her situation a little differently.

When she would try and come over her mom would give her a dog treat and told her when she would see the dogs getting up, she needed to throw the treats opposite from the direction she was going to. Her mom was a genius we told ourselves, I immediately went to my mom and told her what she was doing, so we went to the store and bought dog treats too! This solution worked out great we no longer had problems going back and forth because the dogs came to liking us due to the fact we would give them treats so they would not attack us, and I'm sure they liked that idea. We were basically bribing them to not attack us by giving them what they loved.
  My childhood would always be drawn back to this moment! Even though we grew up to be pretty good friends up to high school we no longer keep in touch but when we see each other we sit back and start to remember all the silly things we did together. The memories will always be there no matter how much time will pass by.