Happy Halloween

I'm taking this Sunday as my free post Mrs. White :)

Those Winter Days

I really like this poem, it's tone was a little different than the other poems we have read and I liked that. The tone was guilt-ridden or regretful and almost scolding or forewarning. The first stanza really shows this. It talks about her father getting up early in the morning, "in the blueblack cold." Blueblack just made me think of frostbite, it was describing that it was cold enough that a person could develop frostbite. The last line of the stanza, "No one ever thanked him.", shows that regretful or guilty tone.
The second stanza talks about how the father worked to get a fire going to get the house to warm up but the last line of this stanza confused me. It says, "fearing the chronic angers of that house." I'm not sure what this line means, I thought perhaps there was a family feud going on or the father was strict in disciplining. Perhaps the father even beat his children.
The third stanza shows more of that guilty tone and the third stanza was where I thought was that forewarning because it asks a rhetorical question. I also thought it was kind of like forewarning because it tells us all the things the father did and how unappreciated he was so it's like a warning to love and appreciate your father and family.

I thank you god

Shelby and I chose this poem to present in front of this class, we really liked it because it was really religious and we were able to relate to it very well. We thought the punctuation, capitalization, and even some of the wording was kind of strange but figured that it was to help put emphasis on certain things. For example in the first line it says, "i thank YOU God for most this amazing day:", the capitalization of you emphasizes God and instead of saying, for this most amazing day, puts an emphasis on thanking God.
In the first stanza we thought it was mostly about thanking God for all he has done for us, and everything he has created, the, "leaping greenly spirits of trees and a blue true dream of sky;". The line after this is somewhat confusing, "and for everything which is natural which is infinite which is yes." We agreed that the author was excitedly thanking God for everything and he is listing of all these things and then stops and just breathes for a moment.
The next stanza we believed was talking about baptizing since it says, "i who have died am alive again today," When a person is baptized they allow God into their heart and all their sins are washed away, they have a clean slate or a new beginning. So we thought this was like their old self died and was reborn in a way. The lines after that is like the celebration or appreciation of earth and the reawakening the person had with God. The stanza after that was like a reminder for people to count their blessings because God was the one that created everything even their senses like tasting and touching.
The very last two lines, "now the ears of my ears awake and now the eyes of my eyes are opened," was like what we related to as when you have that light bulb moment and everything suddenly makes sense. The author is seeing things with a new awareness and it's like everything just clicks into place for him. He sees the earth and himself as a creative and wondrous thing God created.

To Myself

I know we have talked about this poem in class and the class had discussed what they thought the poem was about but I came up with a different perspective of the poem. As I was reading this poem it made me think of someone that has lost themselves, such as when a person experiences a tragedy in their life or a change in themselves they can become lost. A tragedy such as loosing a loved one can make someone so depressed that they drop out of their normal routine and feel lost in life because they are consumed with that sadness. They no longer feel like the person they once were before the incident. A change in themselves, I pictured as someone developing an addiction problem to alcohol or drugs. When a person becomes an alcoholic or a drug addict, sometimes they remember the time before they became addicted and they feel like they lost that person they were before the drugs or alcohol. This especially pertained to the part in the poem, "I keep remembering you sometimes long ago,".
I think we might have discussed this in class, that the poem might have been about that theoretical journey people take to find themselves but because the poem kept talking about remembering, looking for, and forgetting it wasn't about finding themselves.

P.S. Sorry this was so short, this was just all I had to say. It might have been because the poem was short.