Poetry Chapbook

Poetry Chapbook

Poem 1-

Flying Bear

Dropout bear

Ye’s bear

Everyones bear

He shoots up into the sky and people watch him pass by

Graduation

Like a bolt of lightning nothings gonna stop him now

Teddy bear

Kanye bear

Everyones bear

Like a shooting star he flies way up

Up to the moon and beyond

Nothing gonna stop him now

Stop him now

Stop him now

I wrote this poem inspired by Kanye West, one of the greatest rap artists and poets out there.  This was based off of the album cover of Graduation, his 3^rd album and is widely considered to be one of his best.  In this poem I used short lines to emphasize the meaning of the couple of words on each line. I also used a heavy amount of repitition to let one line sink into the readers head, therefore giving the poem greater meaning.

Poem 2 (Haikus)-

Pointed mountain tops

Fill the sky

White snow everywhere

Jutted mountain peaks

Tower so tall

Blue sky

Steep slopes in the distance

Orange cloudy sky

Moody

I wrote these poems inspired by the mountain range of the Himalayas, more specifically a picture taken of Mount Everest. These poems are short but convey lots of meaning about the setting of what I based them off of.  I used simple words and even lines with singular words to show simplicity but at the same time a very complex meaning.

Heart Poem Essay-

            My heart poem that I chose was Starry Night by Anne Sexton. This was a great poem to analyze and to think critically about. It also contains a great variety of literary devices and sophisticated, unusual words.  The poem also has great meaning to it and can be interpreted in a wide view of angles. The poem also has personal meaning to me and most people that end up reading this poem can connect to it one way or another.

            This poem utilizes lots of personification, metaphors and similies which gives the poem great depth and meaning. For example an excellent simile that was used in the poem would be “One black haired tree slips up like a drowned woman into the hot night sky.”  This compares the large, hulking tree in the foreground of the poem to a a big figure, namely a drowned woman in the night sky.  This is a powerful simile and gives this big mysterious figure life or something that had a different life. An example of personification in the poem would be “Even the moon bulges in its orange irons to push children, like a god.”  This gives life to something that otherwise wouldn’t have life and is an in animate object. In this case the moon is given human characteristics and is doing something that a human would usually do. This shows how the literary devices in the poem give it much greater depth and meaning.

            The poem also has some personal meaning to it aswell and does a great job of giving somebody elses perspective of The Starry Night by Vincent Van Gogh.  It describes the main and essential parts of the painting and compares them to many different things. For example it talks abut the sky, the stars, the trees ant the small town in the background of the painting and gives them a personality and something deeper to them. The poem has personal meaning to me too.  It gives one of my favorite paintings by one of the most famous artists a personality and explores multiple meanings behind the poem.

Book Essay

You would think that growing up in a room with no connection to the outside world would be horrible and degrading to your mind. However this is surprisingly the opposite for Jack a kid who was supposedly born into captivity. In the book Room by Emma Donoghue a kid learns to grow up, with his mother in a world of darkness but is somehow intelligent about the world surrounding him.

Since the characters of this book are living in a tiny world of darkness, the reader may make expectations about how much the characters know about the outside world and regular American ways. Jack, a 5 year old boy that has never seen the outside world and whose only  other human connection to him is his is 27 year old mom has a decent level of knowledge that the average 5 year old would have, even without any schooling or people teaching him. For example Jack can speak relitively good English even though the only other person he’s heard speak is his mother and himself. He also picks up various things from watching TV shows such as Sponge Bob, or Dora the Explorer and learns a bit more about how the world ouside of his room works and functions. This shows that even though Jack has been trapped inside a tiny room for his entire life he still has some intelligence of the outside world.

On the other hand because he has had no worldy exposuere some things that his mom shows him or things he watches on TV he can sometimes mistake for being either something real or something else that is fake. He is often met with certain questions that if he was a normal 5 year old he could answer with ease but instead he wont know what to say because he knows nothing of the world. For example someone on TV that speaks in a different language that he doesn’t know about he will call a fake or made up language that people only use in TV shows or movies.  He also cannot read that well so he is forced to only read picture books or simple books or else he wont understand their meaning.

Even though he obviously has flaws, the fact that he was raised with nobody but his mother and knows what he knows is incredible. He obviously knows less then the average 5 year old he has much more knowledge then anybody else that was his age and in his situation.  He can learn how to mesure himself and make musical beats on different items without any background in these areas. These two things are something that even a normal 5 year old wouldn’t know how to do and some of his knowledge is even greater then a normal kid.

            Even as unfortunate as jack is and his situations are there is always a bright side to to everything that they do. This text shows that you can make something out of nothing and that you can learn a certain amount of knowledge from literally living in the dark.

Authors Note

            Many people think that they can do anything without work and effort, they also think that they can achieve something without doing that once. This is a false conception that many people share with each other and is a problem in this society.  For example most highly successful athletes and businessmen never started off naturally being able to do a certain craft right away. A prime example is Michael Jordan, who didn’t make his high school basketball team and was told by many people that he would never be successful. After pushing and persevering he was eventually able to make himself one, if not the best basketball players of all time. Michael Jordan is a prime example of someone who practically everyone knows, not giving up and not listening to negativity but making himself into something.

            I learned this the hard way when I thought that I could play basketball and immediately be amazing at it.  I learned that this is completely wrong and that my prediction was very wrong.  I started off horrible and mediocre at it and thought of giving up multiple times but friends and family pushed my up and convinced me to keep going.  Eventually I found myself doing really good and using skills I have acquired over the last few years of playing on the court to improve my game.  I am still by no means a great player, but a better one then I would have been if I had given up before. Writing this book is very important to me so I can share an important story of perseverance and not ever giving up.

            My hope for this story is that my readers will take this book and reflect on their lives and tell themselves not to give up even after harsh times. Whether that’s giving up on homework or something bigger like a sport or an education.

Synthesis page

Synthesis Page For: I Am Hostage Three.

                  How does the relationship between Amy and Farouz effect the storyline of the book.   

A hostage, Amy developed a relationship with one of the pirates, Farouz and they are secretly meeting with and have feelings for each other.  This was extremely problematic for them two and the rescue mission that came after the hostages. This relationship also came out of no where and I found myself in shock after finding this out. (This began on page 110) At the end of the book Farouz, the pirate unfortunately gets killed which was saddening but also predictable. The author chose to make Farouz someone that the reader could feel bad about and like because he often tells stories of his homeland, Somalia and the hardships that he has faced and why he was forced into the life of piracy. He often explains that he never wanted to do this and that he was forced into his position. In the end when he dies the reader will feel heart broken and will feel for the characters of the book. Lots of books feature this kind of relationship, where two unsuspecting people fall in love with each other then one of them will be found in an unfortunate situation. I think it was good to have a plot twist like this or else the book would have been boring and no where as interesting to read. 

A relationship as obscure as this can symbolize that you can find love anywhere, even if its in the middle of a hostage situation, but that nothing lasts forever and anything can happen at any time.  This book was unique because all along I had a prediction that he was going to end up dead. On page 327 The pirates are onshore with their randsom money and the navy kills every last one of the pirates, including Farouz which left Amy heartbroken and in shock.  This also leaves the readers in shock because we develop such a close relationship and start to feel for the character in the end of the book.  We also know that he is a good person and know that he doesn’t deserve to be put to this fate at the end of the book.

I think that the author of the book wrote this book for a couple reasons one of which to show that the weirdest things can come out of a weirder situation.  This element of the book shows readers that anything can happen even if you don’t expect it.  One more reason that the author wrote this book is to spread awareness on the situation in Somalia.  For example on page 230, Farouz is telling Amy a story about his country and it really makes you feel bad for his people and the conditions of what they are living through.  There is lots of poverty and violence in Somalia that many western people do not know about, including myself. This book spreads awareness about this topic even though this information is often shown indirectly to the reader.