POETRY EXPLICATION A poetry explication is a relatively short analysis which describes the possible meanings and relationships of the words, images, and other small units that make up a poem. Writing an explication is an effective way for a reader to connect a poems plot and conflicts with its structural features. I need to do a poetry explication about any poem... it can be short or long it doesn't matter. It should be explained in 1 1/2 pages double spaced Thank you

POETRY EXPLICATION A poetry explication is a relatively short analysis which describes the possible meanings and relationships of the words, images, and other small units that make up a poem. Writing an explication is an effective way for a reader to connect a poems plot and conflicts with its structural features. I need to do a poetry explication about any poem... it can be short or long it doesn't matter. It should be explained in 1 1/2 pages double spaced Thank you

User_3883 added on 10/29/13 at 03:53 AM (PST):

POETRY EXPLICATION A poetry explication is a relatively short analysis which describes the possible meanings and relationships of the words, images, and other small units that make up a poem. Writing an explication is an effective way for a reader to connect a poems plot and conflicts with its structural features.

PREPARING TO WRITE THE EXPLICATION Read the poem silently, then read it aloud. Repeat as necessary. Consider the poem as a dramatic situation in which a speaker addresses an audience or another character. In this way, begin your analysisby identifying and describing the speaking voice or voices, the conflicts or ideas, and the language used in the poem.

IDENTIFY THE LARGE ISSUES Determine the basic design of the poem by considering thewho, what, when, where, andwhyof the dramatic situation. What is being dramatized? What conflicts or themes does the poem present, address, or question? Who is the speaker? Define and describe the speaker and his/her voice. What does the speaker say? Who is the audience? Are other characters involved? What happens in the poem? Consider the plot or basic design of the action. How are the dramatized conflicts or themes introduced, sustained, resolved, etc.? Whendoes the action occur? What is the date and/or time of day? Where is the speaker? Describe the physical location of the dramatic moment. Why does the speaker feel compelled to speak at this moment? What is his/her motivation?

IDENTIFY THE DETAILS Form: Does the poem represent a particular form (sonnet, sestina, etc.)? Does the poem present any unique variations from the traditional structure of that form? Rhetoric: How does the speaker make particular statements? Does the rhetoric seem odd in any way? Why? Consider the predicates and what they reveal about the speaker. Syntax: Consider the subjects, verbs, and objects of each statement and what these elements reveal about the speaker. Do any statements have convoluted or vague syntax? Vocabulary: Why does the poet choose one word over another in each line? Do any of the words have multiple or archaic meanings that add other meanings to the line? Use the Oxford English Dictionary as a resource. IDENTIFY THE PATTERNS Rhetorical Patterns: Look for statements that follow the same format. Rhyme: Consider the significance of the end words joined by sound; in a poem with no rhymes, consider the importance of the end words. Patterns of Sound: Alliteration and assonance create sound effects and often cluster significant words. Visual Patterns: How does the poem look on the page? Rhythm and Meter: Consider how rhythm and meter influence our perception of the speaker and his/her language.

WRITE THE EXPLICATION The first paragraph The first paragraph should present the large issues; it should inform the reader which conflicts are dramatized and should describe the dramatic situation of the speaker. The explication does not require a formal introductory paragraph; the writer should simply start explicating immediately. According to UNC s Professor William Harmon, the foolproof way to begin any explication is with the following sentence: This poem dramatizes the conflict between Such a beginning ensures that you will introduce the major conflict or theme in the poem and organize your explication accordingly. For example: This poem dramatizes the conflict between appearance and reality, particularly as this conflict relates to what the speaker seems to say and what he really says. The next couple of paragraphs (2 to 4 paragraphs) The next paragraphs should expand the discussion of the conflict by focusing on details of form, rhetoric, syntax, and vocabulary. In these paragraphs, the writer should explain the poem line by line in terms of these details, and he or she should incorporate important elements of rhyme, rhythm, and meter during this discussion. Conclusion Do not simply restate the main points of the introduction! The end of the explication should focus on sound effects or visual patterns as the final element of asserting an explanation. Finally the conclusion should draw your main ideas together and reflect on their impact on understanding the poem.

User_3883 added on 10/29/13 at 04:03 AM (PST):

o you say Singing at night alone? It is enough to rise and fall Here in my basin of stone. But are you content as you seem to be So near the freedom and rush of the sea? I have listened all night to its laboring sound, It heaves and sags, as the moon runs round; Ocean and fountain, shadow and tree, Nothing escapes, nothing is free. Sara Teasdale (American, l884-1933)

As a direct address to an inanimate object The Fountain presents three main conflicts concerning the appearance to the observer and the reality in the poem. First, since the speaker addresses an object usually considered voiceless, the reader may abandon his/her normal perception of the fountain and enter the poets imaginative address. Secondly, the speaker not only addresses the fountain but asserts that itspeaks and sings,personifying the object with vocal abilities. These acts imply that, not only can the fountain speak in a musical form, but the fountain also has the ability to present some particular meaning (what do you say (1)). Finally, the poet gives the fountain a voice to say that its perpetual motion (rising and falling) is enough to maintain its sense of existence. This final personification fully dramatizes the conflict between the fountains appearance and the poems statement of reality by giving the object intelligence and voice. The first strophe, four lines of alternating 4- and 3-foot lines, takes the form of a ballad stanza. In this way, the poem begins by suggesting that it will be story that will perhaps teach a certain lesson. The opening trochees and repetition stress the address to the fountain, and the iamb which ends line 1 and the trochee that begins line 2 stress the actions of the fountain itself. The response of the fountain illustrates its own rise and fall in the iambic line 3, and the rhyme of alone and stone emphasizes that the fountain is really a physical object, even though it can speak in this poem. The second strophe expands the conflicts as the speaker questions the fountain. The first couplet connects the rhyming words be and sea these connections stress the question, Is the fountain content when it exists so close to a large, open body of water like the ocean? The fountain responds to the tempting rush of the sea with much wisdom (6). The fountains reply posits the sea as laboring versus the speakers assertion of its freedom; the sea becomes characterized by heavily accented heaves and sags and not open rushing (7, 8). In this way, the fountain suggests that the seas waters may be described in images of labor, work, and fatigue; governed by the moon, these waters are not free at all. The as of line 8 becomes a key word, illustrating that the seas waters are not free but commanded by the moon, which is itself governed by gravity in its orbit around Earth. Since the moon, an object far away in the heavens, controls the ocean, the sea cannot be free as the speaker asserts. The poet reveals the fountains intelligence in rhyming couplets which present closed-in, epigrammatic statements. These couplets draw attention to the contained nature of the all objects in the poem, and they draw attention to the final lines lesson. This last line works on several levels to address the poems conflicts. First, the line refers to the fountain itself; in this final rhymed couplet is the illustration of the waters perpetual motion in the fountain, its continually recycled movement risingand falling. Second, the line refers to the ocean; in this respect the water cannot escape its boundary or control its own motions. The ocean itself is trapped between landmasses and is controlled by a distant objects gravitational pull. Finally, the line addresses the speaker, leaving him/her with an overriding sense of fate and fallacy. The fallacy here is that the fountain presents this wisdom of reality to defy the speakers original idea that the fountain and the ocean appear to be trapped and free. Also, the direct statement of the last line certainly addresses the human speaker as well as the human reader. This statement implies that we are all trapped or controlled by some remote object or entity. At the same time, the assertion that Nothing escapes reflects the limitations of life in the world and the death that no person can escape. Our own thoughts are restricted by our mortality as well as by our limits of relying on appearances. By personifying a voiceless object, the poem presents a different perception of reality, placing the reader in the same position of the speaker and inviting the reader to question the conflict between appearance and reality, between what we see and what we can know. SUGGESTIONS FOR IMPROVEMENT: The writer observes and presents many of the most salient points of the short poem, but she could indeed organize the explication more coherently. To improve this explication, the writer could focus more on the speakers state of mind. In this way, the writer could explore the implications of the dramatic situation even further: why does the speaker ask a question of a mute object? With this line of thought, the writer could also examine more closely the speakers movement from perplexity (I am trapped but the waters are free) to a kind of resolution (the fountain and the sea are as trapped as I am). Finally, the writer could include a more detailed consideration of rhythm, meter, and rhyme