Poetry

I have always enjoyed reading poetry, but for some reason I have not read any for a long time. I like that they are full of emotion, and a lot of poems that I have enjoyed the most relaxed me when I read them. Some I have read, did not made any sense. I did not enjoy reading those kind of poems. I just hoped that I do not have to read the type that I don't enjoy, for this class. So far they have been good, and I had not heard any of them before. As a teenager, I did read a lot of poetry and I had always thought that music seemed like poetry because it is so expressive and has a rhythm, just like poetry does. So far I have not learned anything new about it , but I am curios to see if I do.

Of the poems that I have read so far for this class, I enjoyed reading "So Mexicans are Taking Jobs from Americans" by Jimmy Santiago Baca. I found it interesting to find a subject like this written as a poem because it seemed like it would have made a great article in a magazine or newspaper. But then I figured it would have lost some of it power. It was a very emotional poem and obviously the speaker had strong feelings about this subject. I related to the speaker because I don't think that it is fair to say someone can not come to America to work. America is a mixture of people from all over that came here to find a better life, or work, when they could not find it where they were from. Mexicans may have jobs here, but they also spend money here which creates the need for business, and business creates more jobs. I am glad to see someone find a creative way to express their feelings on a subject like this.

Poetry Experiences

I have had some experience with poetry, but not a whole lot. I went to a small high school and there wasn't much emphasis on poetry. I had one class that had anything to do with poetry and we didn't spend a whole lot of time on it. That class was my sophmore year so there isn't a whole lot that I remember about it. I like simple poems that are easy to read and understand and I like poems that rhyme because I find them easier to read and understand. I like to find the rhythm in a poem too. I find poetry intimidating because it's not all laid out for the reader. The reader of poetry has to actually think and try to find meaning behind it. I ended up reading through a few of the poems from this unit more than once because I didn't get a whole lot out of them after reading them only once. Based on my past experiences with poetry, I have mixed feelings about it. Some of the longer poems I found tougher than the shorter ones so that part was confirmed, but because of the poem "Jump Cabling," I was reminded that not all poetry is hard to interpret. I have mixed feelings about the rest of the units on poetry, but I am going to give it my best shot!

Poetry

I have not had as much experince in poetry as other things. I do, however, think it is very interesting and I am excited to be reading and doing poetry. I am not very good at writing poems, I do like to read them though. I always feel that poetry should rhyme, eventhough I know that it does not necessarly have to rhyme. Agian I am very excited about this unit!

Poetry and Me

I am very excited about entering the poetry section of this class as I find poetry extremely interesting. Unfortunately I don’t have that much experience writing poems other than recently writing my son a poem on his Valentines card, although it was the classic Roses are Red, Violets are Blue... he loved it. Reading it, on the other hand, I do have some experience with. When I was pregnant with my first child, my husband would read poems to my belly each night so I got familiar and started to enjoy poetry. I do find some poems intimidating due to the deeper meaning that I sometimes don’t get. I went in to this unit with an open mind and just started reading; I remembered a lot of what I read but also learned new things as well. Growing up, I had always thought of poetry as this romantic thing, only to have found out that it can be a platform for people to express their opinions on many other things besides love: politics, war, culture, and the environment. It can be pretty powerful.

My Relationship With Poetry

What do I think of poetry? I started thinking how reading poetry is kind of like a relationship with a guy. To put it simply, sometimes you love them and totally get it, and sometimes you just don't know what their point is or why you waste your time. My feelings towards poetry are very similar. In the past, I have found poems that really moved me and stirred a longing within to have same ability to capture such incomprehensible things, such as thoughts and feelings, in lines of black and white words. Other times, I have become frustrated with the vagueness or my own inability to find any meaning in a certain line or the entire work. But, I've learned it's the same with guys and poetry, you can always appreciate them for their unique ability to distract and entertain you, whether or not you fully understand their message. Keeping an open mind also helps!

Poetry and Me

I am really going to enjoy this portion of our class. Poetry has always held a special place in my heart. I took 2 poetry classes in high school--reading and writing poetry. I have written several poems, one of which was published when I was very young in our church bulletin and I won $5.00 for it at the time. I have not written poetry for quite awhile so that may be difficult for me now but I am a collector of poems and I have kept all of my favorite poems throughout the years and have even started a "scrapbook" with designer pages. I love applying poems to every day life and sometimes they make me sad, sometimes they cheer me up. We recently had to have our beloved cat of 14 years, Tuffy, put to sleep and it was very difficult for all of us. I read the poem, "Four Feet in Heaven" by Alice Chase and it was very comforting to me to know that Tuffy is being taken care of in Heaven.

My Thoughts on Poetry

One of my great grandmothers was a published poet. She was also one of my greatest role models. I wanted to do everything like her, so in elementary school, I wrote many poems. I love words and language, and I love rhyme and rhythm. I am one of the strange few who actually enjoys reading the dictionary. Maybe I should not have admitted that, but I really do love learning new words, playing with words, learning word origins, and so on and so forth. Thus, poetry kind of excites me, but only if it rhymes. I really have a hard time getting into poems that do not rhyme, and I know I will have to get over that for this class.

I spent some time studying poetry for my ninth grade English class and my tenth grade Language and Composition course. The poems we studied were very diverse, but some used very formal, antiquated diction that was incredibly hard to read and even harder to interpret. Symbolism in poetry intimidates me. I have a terrible time searching for "deeper meaning," as I often miss it altogether. I also have a hard time recognizing irony and satire when I am reading. When I do recognize the symbolism or satire in poems, however, it makes me feel like I've just discovered buried treasure. It can add so much more meaning to the poems. I hope that discussing the poems we read will help me to interpret them accurately.

Before I started reading the poems for this unit, I was nervous that they would be too "deep" for me to understand or too wordy to hold my attention. As I read them, however, I was pleasantly surprised to find that they were fairly simplistic in diction, although I was incredibly disappointed that none of them rhymed. Nonetheless, I did enjoy all of the unit eight poems (except "Moving Camp Too Far," which I could not find anywhere). I love that poems can shed new light on topics that have been over-discussed (in my opinion) in other genres of literature. "Jump Cabling" did just that. It provided a new, and somewhat humorous way, of looking at romantic attraction.

I am a little nervous about our poetry unit, as I am not sure if I will be able to comprehend the meanings of the poems. However, I am looking forward to reading some new material, and I am really hoping that some of the poems rhyme!

Past Experiences with Poetry - By Leah S

In the past I have never liked the thought of "poetry". It makes you think too much, there are too many interpretations, I don't understand it. It is all about rhymes and words that I don't understand. These are all things I have thought in the past when having to start studying poetry. After reading the five poems tonight I have a bit of a different outlook. Though I did not like all of them, I was able to understand them and also enjoyed a couple of them.

In high school I remember trying to memorize poetry by making it into a song. Sort of like the youtube video that was posted...though I was never that cool.

I think due to what I have learned in this class already, including classes from the past, I am much more open at this time to studying more poetry. I am not going to say I will like it but I will do my best to understand and comprehend it. Besides, the goal of the class is to learn is it not?

"Doe Season"

"They were the same woods that lay behind her house, and they stretch all the way to here, she thought...(paragragh 1). Thinking of this gave Andy comfort that things don't seem to chang in her childhood. This is why when she entered the woods things seemed different. This was the beginning of Andy's change into adulthood. As a child she had foundcomfort in knowing that things were always the same. The ocean had scared her and she did not feel comfortable walking into the unkown water. Her mother was not afraid and this made her think of the unexpected chages of becoming an adult. "Blowing through the treetops, it sounded like the ocean, and once Andy thought she could smell salt air." (paragraph 45) The wind in the woods reminded her of the ocean and how frightened she was by it. This symbolized her fear of the unknown in the woods and of shooting a deer. Andy is aware that a change his coming but is not sure what it is until she shoots the doe and saw it lying dead. At this point she realized that she had changed and she no longer wanted to be known as Andy.

Doe Season

Childhood can be compared to the description of the woods being "always the same", in that when you think as a child, changes don't impact you as much as long as you have the basics (mom,dad, home, food, school, etc.). A child's life is fairly simplified and a child will look at his surroundings and see them as just part of his world. When a child grows into a teenager and then an adult, "the woods", or familiar places (like home), become much smaller and life can be better compared to the ocean. In this "ocean", the world becomes much larger and more complex as the maturing mind begins to analyze everything around it and connecting oneself to these surroundings in a different way. Andy discovered that her actions had changed the world, a living being stopped existing because of her choice. In the same way, teenagers and adults begin to see how their choices render the consequences around them. For Andy, the shooting of the doe triggered her transition from a comfortable, simple existence to the "terrible, now inevitable, sea" of adulthood, wherein she has already discovered that many questions don't have easy answers and many problems don't have simple solutions. Even her name has lost it's innocence and she runs from the fallen doe with the thought that "she would no longer be called that [Andy]".

Doe Season

"They were always the same woods, she thought sleepily as they drove the early morning darkness." (pg.1) This was Andy's thoughts about the woods as her father and her leave on a journey that will change Andy's life forever. The woods in which they are about to retreat to are so large that Andy believes they connect to her home and cross country. This is well related to how she explains the ocean when she visited it. Andy was not afraid of the woods. In fact she was quite excited to be on hunting trip with her father; even if it also involved Charlie and his son Mac, a friened of her fathers. Andy was scared of the ocean the first time just as she was to shoot her first deer. If her father hdn't been so persistant she may not have shot at the doe. Andy's dream was quite disturbing yet it changed something inside her; almost as if she understood the doe. "huge and empty, yet always moving." (pg.45) This is the same as the ocean always has waves yet not people and the woods always has animals moving around in it yet without the wind or people. At the end of the story is no longer "Andy" after shooting the doe, she must then become Andrea.

Doe Season

In the story Doe Season. It talks about how the wind "blowing through the tree tops, it sounded like the ocean, and it frieghtend her." It was huge and empty and always moving". (459) I think Andy was hoping to become an adult, with going out and making her first kill, with the other adults. As the story talks about the woods being huge and empty like the ocean, which she was also scared of. She was scared to walk out in the ocean, afraid of how deep it was or what might be in there that she couldn't see. She was also scared to pull the trigger, scared of killing the deer. But when she was in the ocean, she was too scared to go out to deep, showing the child side of her. And when out in the woods, when she made her first kill, is when she went from childhood to adulthood.

"The Chrysanthemums"

There may be two different symbolic things here.
Elisa Allen is smbolic of women in the olden days who minded their own business and did what women were supposed to do. "When she heard him splashing in the tub, Elisa laid hie dark suit on the bed, and shirt and socks and tie beside it. She stood his polished shoes on the floor beside the bed."(p.638. 95) In this statement of her actions, Elisa had been the prime wife in those days symbolically showing her husband that she knows her place. Then there is the chrysanthemums.
The chrysanthemums are symbolic of what she would like to be. They seem to portray the idea that she would like to rid of certain things in her life and do more. "It's when you're picking off the buds you don't want." This is symbolic of her regret and desires all at the same time. The colors of the flowers may be used to interpret her longing to be bright (happy). "Kind of a long-stemmed flower? Looks like a quick puff of colred smoke?" he asked.p.635) "Quick puff of colored smoke": can symbolize a sense of boldness and independence, all things that she does not stand for (only desires to).

"The Chrysanthemums"

"The Chrysanthemums"

The chrysanthemums symbolize Elisa Allen; beautiful, strong, earthbound. The story occurs at a time where a woman’s place was well defined. They are to embody feminism, do menial household tasks, and leave the serious work to men. When the man in the wagon showed up she secretly envied him, he represented all she could not be. He was free, independent, in charge of his own destiny. His hands were cracked and unwashed, her own protected by gloves. Knowing she could never live that kind of life, the idea of something she grew and that which represented her, the chrysanthemums, “escaping” her garden was the next best thing. After the man leaves she prepares for her night out. Despite yearning to break the convention she is expected to adhere to, she makes herself attractive in the typical feminine style. She scrubbed the soil and rough spots off her body, put on a fancy dress, and put on rouge. On the way to town for a typical night out of dinner and a movie, something her husband mentioned jokingly earlier suddenly intrigued her. Going to see men fight, witnessing the violence, something a proper woman should have no interest in, sparked her curiosity. After casually inquiring about the fight she relents and tearfully relinquished into her place as a proper woman. At least the potted chrysanthemum was on its way to an unknown destiny.

Doe Season

Andy compared the distance of the woods and the ocean and the moon. I see this compare and contrast as how small or young that she views herself. She states in the first paragraph that the woods are always the same, but yet when they arrived to hunt in them, they were then different. Four hunters making noise and tracks in these quiet woods. They were small compared to the mile and miles of woods, just like the ocean in paragraph 45. "The ocean was huge and empty, yet always moving". The woods are huge and appear to be empty when you want them to be full of deer during deer season. But the animals are always moving.
In her memory, she is afraid of what is under the water, but admires her mom for going out past the break point. Her mother was very brave, and I think she is very brave for going on a hunting trip with all men, trying to impress them.
She shot the first doe, which I think proves how quick she is growing up in this story. Along with her not wanting to be called Andy anymore. She wanted to be called by her grown woman name from now on.

"Doe Season"

Andy first states that the woods were “always the same.”(paragraph 1). Andy finds out by going on her first hunting trip that they are not always the same. This time she would have to do something that she thought she was ready to do; which was to shoot a deer. She was afraid of this. Andy recalled another time when she was afraid. This was a new experience for Andy and it brought her back to a previous experience that she encountered. It was when she first saw the ocean water, which scared her. Andy recalled that the ocean water did not scare her mother. “Her mother had floated beyond the breakers, calling her to come in, but Andy wouldn’t go farther than a few feet into the surf.” (paragraph 45). David Michael Kaplan wanted to compare the innocence and fearfulness of a child to the bravery and courageousness of an adult. In paragraph 1, “always the same woods” symbolizes childhood because someone is always going to be there to protect you. Later in the story when Andy recalls the ocean as being “huge and empty, yet always moving,” on paragraph 45, symbolizes that how life changes when you become an adult. Andy’s life changed and she grew up when she realized that the woods were not always the same. The hunting trip also made Andy realize that sometimes you do things that you don’t want to do. It also made her realize that things are not always what they seem to be.

"Doe Season"

Throughout David Kaplan's "Doe Season," Andy mentally compares and contrasts the woods that she resides in with the ocean she once visited. This contrast symbolizes the similarities and differences between childhood and the adult world which Andy is exploring.

Andy is comforted by the woods because "they were always the same". She thinks to herself, "They stretch [...] longer than I could walk in a day [...], but they are still the same woods" (456). These woods are like her life as a child--safe, comforting, predictable. "There was no place she would rather be" (458).

However, Andy's recollections of the ocean are just the opposite. The ocean "frightened her." "It was huge and empty, yet always moving. Everything lay hidden" (459). While both the ocean and woods were quite expansive (possibly signifying the vast array of experiences in both childhood and adulthood), the ocean was everything the woods were not. It was scary, unnerving, and unpredictable.

As Andy follows her father through a majority of the hunt, she remains comfortably within her role as a child. Her father is nearby, and life is simple. He tells her what to do, and she does it. He is around to protect her, guide her, and ensure her welfare, just as the woods are always around her as a security blanket.

The moment Andy is handed the gun, however, she momentarily enters the world of adulthood. The status quo has suddenly changed, and she must make her own decision: shoot the doe to please the hunting party, or let the doe run off to safety. No one can choose for her. Her situation is much like the ocean she recalls, which was "always moving" and in which "Everything lay hidden." She has yet to discover what the consequences of either decision may entail. Later, as Andrea flees the scene while her father guts the deer, she realizes that the "sea" of adulthood is "now inevitable" (467).

Thus, the contrast between the woods and the ocean effectively signifies the contrast between childhood and adulthood. Children must eventually become adults by learning to make their own decisions, even when unsure of the consequences.

Doe Season

The woods suggests that Andy's childhood was "always the same" for miles and miles. As she transitions into her adulthood her life would become huge and empty, yet always moving. As stated in paragraph 45 "She and her parents had gone last summer to stay for a week at a motel on the New Jersey shore. That was the first time she'd seen the ocean, and it frightened her." This is also brought up after she shoots the deer. As a child begins to grow, life starts to throw you different things and many different "hurddles" arise. The blood supports the story's initial theme of being scared. Growing up as a child there are many things that scare different people. After Andy shoot's the deer, she is scared initially. She has a nightmare that night but the next day they find the deer and she is no longer scared. Another theme that they may be suggesting is menstration.

Doe Season

Andy and her father and her fathers friend are on a hunting trip far from the ocean and far from
Canada. Andy wants to impress her father and her fathers friend that she can be as good as them even though she is much younger and is of the opposite sex. When Andy first went to the ocean in New Jersey she was frightened of it and she did not like it. When her father asked her if she wanted to shoot the deer even though she didnt have a licence and was not of age she did it anyways and that became her new thing that she was scared of. At the end of the story she decides she does not care if she is of opposite sex or that she is much younger because she likes it just the way she is.