... to willingly decide to temporarily believe the almost unbelievable story. The reason a person is to make sure that he or she believes it temporarily to be true is because the Mariner in the story is trying to get the point of forgiveness from God across to the reader and if the reader chooses not to believe the story behind the poem then they will not understand the effect of the point of the tale. Coleridge's main point in writing the story was to get people to understand forgiveness by understanding the poem. The Mariner in the poem is telling his tale to a "Wedding Guest" who has no choice but to listen and to believe. The "Wedding Guest" in the poem ...

... at them, the reader discerns immediately the focus of the poem. Mid-term Break, conversely, is a title that leads the reader to believe that the poem most likely is about a normal carefree vacation and break from school. The author of this poem used this title ironically. He anticipated the reader’s expectations, and took the poem in a different direction. The character in the story is certainly not having a “normal” spring break at all, as he is spending it grief-stricken over the death of his four-year old brother. If one examines this title on an interpretive level, the word “break” takes on a new meaning, as it could refer to the death of the child as break ...

... only stated simply and bluntly, but the way the lines are broken up accent the idea. "Ready to kill"(3) is on its own line, while "yourself"(4) is on the next. This is the theme that is running throughout the entire poem. In the next section of Lordes poem she describes a dreamlike situation. This is where her son has been shot, probably in the face. Although "blood from his punctured cheeks and shoulders/is the only liquid for miles"(9-10), "my mouth splits into dry lips"(12). With the death of her boy she is willing to sacrifice her own need of any quenching of her lips. She is "thirsting for the wetness of his blood"(14) but it is more important to resi ...

... before it woo, And pamper'd swells with one blood made of two, And this, alas, is more than we would do.(5-9) This stanza also says that the flea enjoys the mixing of blood which is referred to as sex. It is the authors comment that they have intercourse within the flea but that is more than the two of them do together. Saying to her that this would not be adultery suggests that she has a strong faith and is ethically bound to abide by the principals of her religion. His argument is to put down the religion by saying even the flea is mixing our blood, so why shouldn't we? That suggests that the flea is one of God's creatures and so it should follow the pr ...

... Robert Frost brings together many different literary techniques to express the theme or themes of his poem. The two themes that I got from the poem were, 1) the dilemma of making a choice, and the danger of not knowing where that decision will take you, and 2) a tale telling the reader to be different, and to take the road “less traveled”. “And sorry I could not travel both…” It is always hard to make important decisions because you are always going to wonder what might have happened if you had chosen the other path. The speaker has no way of knowing what awaits him at either of his destinations, but he still must choose between the two paths. The most comm ...

... the second paragraph, Coleridge begins reminiscing about a certain day in school, when he was fairly young, "How oft, at school, with most believing mind…have I gazed upon the bars." At first, it appears he was very happy, "So sweetly, that they stirred and haunted me with a wild pleasure…" But as this paragraph progresses, he begins to show the loneliness in his life, "For still I hoped to see the stranger's face." Though his mood begins to change there still is a calm and somber feeling. In paragraph three, Colridge is holding his son, while appreciating nature and what it will give to his child, "it thrills my heart with tender gladness, thus to look a ...

... life in Amherst was based strongly upon religion and Puritan values. The distinctive Puritan virtues of simplicity, austerity, hard work, and denial of flesh, were ever-present disciplines in Emily's life (Sewall 22). Despite her stubborn denials to be labeled, she was very much of a “New Englander”. Cynthia Griffen Wolff, author of Emily Dickinson, points out that Emily “knew every line of the Bible intimately, quoted from it extensively, and referred to it many more times than she referred to any other work... yet in this regard she was not unusual by Amherst's standards” (72). The most prominent figure of religious virtues in her life was her father, Ed ...

... tossed about from one place to another. “ To catch at the barbed wire and hang there, shaking, like a riddled prisoner.” The poet tells us using strong images of pain and injury that the tumbleweed was thrown against a fence, a kind of prison from which it is difficult to escape. So the tumbleweed and the poet are both thrust against the barbed wire of life. This is another metaphor for the poet's difficult life. The poet and the tumbleweed are stuck in a painful, difficult situation. They are prisoners of their surroundings, helpless. “Like a riddled prisoner.” The words riddled prisoner are used to give us a powerful, painful, picture of the lost and hopeless ...

... am a Negro" (1 and 17). Then Hughes describes the works of the Negro by using the terms "slave," "worker," "singer," and "victims" (4, 7, 10, and 14). The first example is a situation that has taken place in Africa; the second in the United States. Finally, Hughes uses repetition of the first and last stanza to conclude his poem. To thoroughly understand the point that Hughes is making, one must take an enhanced inspection at certain elements that Hughes uses throughout the poem. In "Negro", Hughes gives the reader a compact visual exposé of the historical life of blacks. He does not tell the reader in detail about what has happened to blacks; theref ...

... the church. Or, the way I see it, it can mean the act of going to church. The meaning of church has left. The young people are there only because their parents taught them that this was the right thing to do. And, the older people are there out of a sense of duty. Belief is not a factor or consideration. The title is trying to portray going to church as a perfunctory task programmed into the train of thought. To the people in this poem going to church is like grocery shopping. It is something that must be done. Everyone knows it is the right thing to do, except in this case many people do not understand the concept behind it. Religion does not make a dif ...