There are many different forms of literature, but perhaps most famous and most loved of the many kinds is poetry. Compared to other forms of literature like short stories and novels, poetry has been famous dating back to the time of Ancient Greece until now, wherein even poems are converted into modern songs. The wonderful thing about poetry is that not only would the readers be able to imagine the images conjured by the carefully selected words, but the lines in poems would also appeal to the hearing of a person as it involves rhyme and rhythm. After all, poetry is both sights and soundssights being the images imagined by a reader and sounds being the playful or melodramatic onslaught of words. These sights and sounds are both evident in Lisa Parkers Snapping Beans, Mary Olivers Answer, and Glenis Redmonds Naming. But more important than these images and sounds are the lessons or messages that the poems want to show the readers. In this case, the three poems showcase the relationship that each speaker has for the other character mentioned in the poem, and this relationship brings out the unquestionable truth regarding the poems real message, which is admiration for what the other character has in life.
In the poem Snapping Beans, the usual problem of a student who is at lost over a new culture and new life is portrayed. The speaker comes home from school for a vacation I was home for the weekend from school, from the North (Parker, lines 4-5). The descriptions of the surrounding seem to suggest that the home is located in the countryside as the sun rose, pushing its pink spikes through the slant of cornstalks (7-8). The main issue that the poem presents is the dishonesty of the student as his or her grandmother wants to know his or her school life, and though the student wants to tell the real things that happen in school and the feelings that he or she has about them, he or she opted not to.
That about summarizes the poem of Parker, but the theme of the poem exists in the relationship that the student has for his or her grandmother. The student is in conflict of whether informing the grandmother about the reality of things concerning life and school such as the evening star was a planet that my friends wore nose rings and wrote poetry About sex, about alcoholism, about Buddha (29-31). Although the student wants to let the grandmother to know his or her real predicament in school, in the end, he or she refuses to tell her to save the grandmothers innocence. This is mainly what the student admires regarding the grandmotherher innocence and ability to be carefree regarding the world as a whole and life at large. The grandmothers main past time is to listen to nature in the countryside while snapping beans, and the student more or less wants this lifestyle as well as he or she feels homesick for the simple life that the grandmother has or is out of place in such a strange world he or she does not truly want and belong to
I wanted to tell her
about the nights I cried into the familiar
heartsick panels of the quilt she made me,
wishing myself home on the evening star. (25-28)
The great yearning of wanting to be home by the student is expressed in these lines that he or she even criesan imagery that presents tremendous longing within the student.
Yet, the grandmothers situation of being at home while the student is in the progressive city is not entirely what he or she admires about the grandmother instead, it is the grandmothers ability to see through things like seeing through the student that even if he or she said that he or she was doing fine in school. The grandmother makes an ominous remark about how funny things are when things blow loose like that (43) which could just mean that the student might suddenly explode one day and his or her feelings of misery might take over him or her entirely.
On the other hand, in Glenis Redmonds Naming, a misunderstanding happens between a mother and the child over the naming of a flower. The speaker who is also the child tries to explain to the mother about the Forsythia, but the mother tells the child that they call it Yellow Bell and the other word is too hard (Redmond, line 3). This naming of the same flower is what causes the conflict as the child uses a more complicated term most likely learned from school and the mother uses a much simpler term most likely learned from their community. The speaker goes on about the differences that the two words cause to both of them with the mother being able to look back on her life caused by the mention of the flower and the child being able to appreciate the simplicity of life brought on by the mention of the simpler term for the flower. The term used for the flower causes conflict, and the fact that the younger person uses a more complex term manifests that he or she has an education while the mother is more used to the simpler and non-complex things provided by her being uneducated or just not knowing a lot of technical things. As how the speaker describes it, the foreign words anguish hisher mothers tongue (16).
Compared to the poem by Parker, Naming by Redmond is more open with the feelings that the speaker has for the mother. The young childs affections towards the mother are shown in the simple confusion over the name of a flower and yet, the child expresses the admiration that he or she has for the mother Her folklore lessons unfold like the bush that inspires (5). While the child may be educated with all the technical and complex terms such as the name of the flower, he or she yearns for the simple things that the mother has like the folklore lessons. On a deeper analysis, such lessons can point to the mother belonging to a close-knit community that could have shared folklores together. Thus, the child wants such relationships which the mother had experienced before.
There are other things which the child further admires concerning the mother, which also further proves the yearning for a relationship with other people that he or she wants her looking back always carries me like a river forward. The balm of her history flows from the heart without tire (10-11). The childs reference to looking back and the history of the mother being something which carries himherforward and like a balm is an indicator that the child thinks highly of the mother and the mothers past. This past is what he or she admires and what he or she wants to have, though it is expressed in a subtle way Her simple words heal and light me gently higher (17).
In Mary Olivers poem, Answers, the same sentiments are expressed as that of the poems of Parker and Redmond. The speaker in the third poem seems be a person to have advanced in the ways of the world, and this persona recalls his or her time with the grandmother who has encouraged him or her with such ways. The poem features the wide gap between the grandmother and the grandchild like the lines of the grandmother being uneducated with faulty grammar and how there is such confusion within her (Oliver, lines 5-15). The grandchild meanwhile is the one who is supposedly educated with his or her books and music and circling philosophies and with the lofty career that the grandmother even encouraged (8-12). Yet, even if the grandchild and the grandmother are very different from one another, the grandchild still envies the grandmother while the grandmother is very much supportive of the grandchild and even cools... hisher wild sauces (15-16).
The student in Olivers Answers also has the same situation in Snapping Beans. The student has changed because of what he or she has experienced but he or she still relies on the grandmother to comfort and console him or her. This is because the student yearns for what the grandmother hasthat of the innocence and naivet with her being termed as uneducated (5). As with the child in Naming, the student in Answers is also more open about his or her emotions concerning the affection and admiration that he or she has for the grandmother If I envy anyone it must be My grandmother in a long ago (1-2). The envy that the student feels is for the simple life that the grandmother has and for the innocence that she has. As with the student of Snapping Beans, the desire to just have a simple life that is devoid of complications is wanted by the student in Answers.
In conclusion, the three poems revolve around the young children or students and the relationship that they have with their elders. The young ones are supposedly the smarter ones with their education and yet, they are not that happy compared to their eldersthe young ones even yearn for what the elders have in their simple situationwhich is uncomplicated freedom. All three poems give out a lesson on how things are with the young and the ability to not be contented with who they are, what they have, and what they are undergoing through. Although the elders seem ignorant of things, it does not mean that they are unhappy. Naming, Answers, and Snapping Beans give out an invaluable lesson in life which is about how the young admire and desire the simple life of the oldproving that a fast-paced life is not the gateway to happinessit is contentment with what a person has that truly matters in the end.
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