You are the neighbor of nothing. You do not see the bruised heart go up in flames, One can only say in reponse that indeed it does come up again and again, in poem after poem from his first book on, to the point of obsession, And we could join Strand in the wish that he expresses thus: "We keep turning the pages,/hoping for something,/something like mercy or change…." There is no great trickery involved in that respect, sadness is portrayed quite literally in this poem, which is great actually. Thank you for your feedback. in Strand’s Poetics 38 Peter Stitt on the Poem as an Attempt to Define the World 40 Critical Analysis of “Elegy for My Father” 42 Critical Views on “Elegy for My Father” 46 Laurence Lieberman on the Use of Litany 46 Richard Howard on the Poem as an Affirmation of Life 48 … the surface, mist at the banks like a net, settling around us—everything damp (Source.). Mark Strand is a poet nostalgic and homesick ruminating over the years, recollecting and reminiscing childhood days spent in the company of mother, father and others of the household felt in Canada and America and the same bonding lengthens it with the affection of his wife and daughter in which he basks tor recreate and repose in. She has a great passion for poetry and literature and works as a teacher and researcher at Universidad de Buenos Aires. Hi there Kavi, If you put a request in on the website we will add it to the list. She is Cape Verdean but was born and raised in Lisbon.). This obsession and this hope have produced at times some pretty unremarkable work. Hi there, that would be an interesting piece of context, if I could find it! Change ), You are commenting using your Facebook account. Therefore, the content of the poem can be easily read in the title. Subscribe to our mailing list to get the latest and greatest poetry updates. Fill in your details below or click an icon to log in: You are commenting using your WordPress.com account. Strand was born in Summerside, Prince Edward Island, Canada. Because it is over. The login page will open in a new tab. Although it’s not really a tough poem to get to grips with in that respect. You can read the full poem here. the hooks loose, the fish writhing, in my hands, each one slipping away The lyrical voice’s grandfather is described as incapable of doing most things (“old and blind”) and as a fixed figure that doesn’t move (“All day by the kitchen fire”). The title of the poem (Elegy For My Father’s Father) is crucial. Please support this website by adding us to your whitelist in your ad blocker. There is a personification of the water (“The tongues of water spoke”) and the man is aware that a voice is talking to him in his dreams.             as though we had written it. Or rather, as the title asserts, it untells one, it undoes itself. First of all, the title is very direct: the poem is about sorrow and praise for the death of a loved one.

This are all attributes that the speaker sees and feels in his lineage. Elegy For My Father’s Father by James K. Baxter, poem is about sorrow and praise for the death, lyrical voice describes the man as cryptic as the language that is used in the poem. You do not see the sun dragging the moon like an echo.

far deeper. Notice the dissimilarity in both descriptions and the difference between his young age and his old age. The “tall tower broken” is used as a metaphor for life. (Source), There are of course many other great paintings by her and hopefully in days/weeks/months to come, I’ll keep going on with this blog and get to them.,,, but for now, here is also one of her famous self-portraits. two small trout we could not keep. Can you please help me with this question:Explore the ways in which the poet vividly expresses feelings of grief in this poem. before I could let go. Elegy for My Father, A poem by bone of my favorite poets, Mark Strand.

Please log in again. (Only appropriate that I add this too since she painted so many great self-portraits and more-so because we are all cast in the shadows of our fathers. 1, Spring, 1974.

Because I had to release them, I confess, I thought about the past—working Death is described as a natural process and the lyrical voice makes a remembrance of the past.
            as though we were in it, So very wonderfully odd is it and so much does it exist in its effects upon the reader that I shall have very little to say about it directly. Thank you for your question. His mood shifts and he starts being more introspective, as he sees life but he can’t enjoy it (“Many hours he had seen/ The stars in their drunken dancing”). Some nights, Friends whose opinions about these matters I usually defer to tell me that I am wrong to value as highly as I do … The Story of Our Lives. And nothing comes back. Strand was a professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University from 2005 until his death in 2014. Mark Strand was awarded the Academy of American Poets Fellowship in 1979 and the Wallace Stevens Award in 2004. So a poem designed to remember someone who has passed away. Indeed, it's hard enough for him to bring himself into imaginative being. Hi there, this is touched on in the analysis. This is why there is the refrain about his heart never speaking.

The pace of the poem is slow and dull.

This website uses cookies to ensure you get the best experience. All day I kept turning to watch you, how Nobody knows you. Could you please help me analyse the thematic frames in the poem Elegy for my father’s father.
(pp. Change ). Elegy for My Father (Robert Strand 1908-1968) 1 THE EMPTY BODY The hands were yours, the arms were yours, But you were not there. The poem also explores the phases of life and relates them to the change from one season to another. unsettling, affectless business. 21-22.).

Do NOT follow this link or you will be banned from the site. ( Log Out /  There is a shore and people are waiting. Secondly, the poem is targeted to a very specific figure “My Father’s Father”.

for an elegy I’d write—one day—, when the time came. He was a New Zealand poet and he is a celebrated figure from his country and most commonly referred as one of their best known poetic figures.

Away from the stars, from the rain of light,