MODELLING FROM WELL-KNOWN LOCAL AND FOREIGN

POETRY WRITERS

A. Examples of Symbolism in Literature

Ah Sunflower (By William Blake)
William Blake goes symbolic in his poem Ah Sunflower. He says:

“Ah Sunflower, weary of time,

Who countest the steps of the sun;
Seeking after that sweet golden clime
Where the traveler’s journey is done;”

Blake uses a sunflower as a symbol for human beings, and “the sun” symbolizes life.
Therefore, these lines symbolically refer to their life cycle and their yearning for a never-ending
life.

Wild Asters (By Sara Teasdale)

Sara Teasdale in her poem Wild Asters develops a number of striking symbols:

“In the spring, I asked the daisies

If his words were true,

And the clever, clear-eyed daisies

Always knew.

Now the fields are brown and barren,

Bitter autumn blows,
And of all the stupid asters

Not one knows.”

In the above lines, “spring” and “daisies” are symbols of youth. “Brown and barren” are
symbols of transition from youth to old age. Moreover, “Bitter autumn” symbolizes death.

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 The Road not Taken (By Robert Frost)

Two roads diverged in a yellow wood,

And sorry I could not travel both
And be one traveler, long I stood
And looked down one as far as I could
To where it bent in the undergrowth;

The roads in the poem are merged where the speaker is standing but lead in two different
directions signifying two different paths in life. Frost begins with the metaphorical meaning as
early as the first line with his reference to “…yellow wood” (line 1). This suggests that the setting
is in the forest during Fall, which is the season of change. The second line, “…sorry I could not
have traveled both” (line 2) expresses the curiosity to explore several possibilities in life. It also
forms a sense of regret at not knowing what could lie ahead on the un-chosen path and the speaker’s
limitation to one lifetime. When Frost says, “And be one traveler…” (line 3) it is obvious that
speaker cannot travel down both paths. He realizes that he needs to make a choice and pick one
path over the other. The speaker’s procrastination and the difficulty in predicting the outcome of
the decision he needs to make is shown when he, “…stood And looked down one as far as I could”
(line3-4). Both roads lead to the unknown, “To where it bent in the undergrowth” (line 5), as do
many choices in life. This is a metaphor to our inability to predict the future, and the fact that
regardless what road is chosen it will not be free of obstacles.
My Last Farewell (By Dr. Jose Rizal)
This famous literary piece was written due to the given social situation where in he
witnessed the slavery, cruelty and brutality towards his beloved fellowmen. Rizal expresses his
willingness to die for his motherland and bids goodbye to his love ones, his country and to all
people whom he cared for.

“Farewell, dear Fatherland, clime of the sun caress’d,

Pearl of the Orient seas, our Eden lost!
Gladly now I go to give thee this faded life’s best,
And were it brighter, fresher, or more blest,
Still would I give it thee, nor count the cost.”

The image of dawn that Rizal used in the first line symbolizes the liberation that he adores.
In the third and fourth line, he says that if the color of liberation lacks his blood, he must dir for
the country to acquire freedom.

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 Pasasalamat Ko kay Nanay (by Paul Pruel)

Sa tuwing sasapit ang petsang ito

Lumulukso sa tuwa ang puso ko
Kung magagawa ko lang dukutin ito
At ialay sa nag-iisa kong mahal na nanay

The lines from the poem expressed exaggeration, a literary device called hyperbole. The
author wanted to convey how grateful he/she was when the special day for his/her mother will
come.

B. Imagery Examples in Literature

Romeo and Juliet (By William Shakespeare)
Imagery of light and darkness is repeated many times in Shakespeare’s Romeo and Juliet. Consider
an example from Act I, Scene V:

“O, she doth teach the torches to burn bright!

It seems she hangs upon the cheek of night
Like a rich jewel in an Ethiope’s ear …”

Romeo praises Juliet by saying that she appears more radiant than the brightly lit torches in the
hall. He says that at night her face glows like a bright jewel shining against the dark skin of an African.
Through the contrasting images of light and dark, Romeo portrays Juliet’s beauty.

To Autumn (By John Keats)

John Keats’ To Autumn is an ode rich with auditory imagery examples. In the last five lines of his
ode he says:

“Or sinking as the light wind lives or dies;

And full-grown lambs loud bleat from hilly bourn;
Hedge-crickets sing; and now with treble soft
The redbreast whistles from a garden-croft,
And gathering swallows twitter in the skies.”

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 The animal sounds in the above excerpt keep appealing to our sense of hearing. We hear
the lamb bleating and the crickets chirping. We hear the whistles of the redbreast robin and the
twitters of swallows in the skies. Keats call these sounds the song of autumn.
Once More to the Lake (By E. B. White)
In prose, imagery aids writers to accomplish a vivid description of events. Below is an
example of an effective use of imagery from E. B. White’s Once More to the Lake:

“When the others went swimming my son said he was

going in, too. He pulled his dripping trunks from the line where
they had hung all through the shower and wrung them out.
Languidly, and with no thought of going in, I watched him, his
hard little body, skinny and bare, saw him wince slightly as he
pulled up around his vitals the small, soggy, icy garment. As he
buckled the swollen belt, suddenly my groin felt the chill of
death.”

The images depicting the dampness of clothes, in the above lines, convey a sense of the
chilly sensation that we get from wet clothes.

Examples of Simile in Literature

A Red, Red Rose (By Robert Burns)

“O my Luve’s
Luve’s like
like aared,
red,red
redrose
rose
That’s newly
That’s newlysprung
sprungininJune;
June;
O my
my Luve’s
Luve’slike
likethe
themelodie
melodie
That’s sweetly
That’s sweetlyplayed
playedin in
tune.”
tune.”

Here, Robert Burns uses a simile to describe the beauty of his beloved. He says that his
love is a fresh red rose that blossoms in the spring.

The Daffodils (By William Wordsworth)

“I wandered lonely as a cloud

that floats on high o’er vales and hills.”

The poet envisions himself as a free cloud that floats alone in a blue sky above valleys
and the mountains. By choosing this simile, Wordsworth describes his loneliness.

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 Sonnet 18 (By William Shakespeare)
A significant thing to consider here is that at times simile is drawn without using the
words “as” or “like.” Consider the following example:

“Shall I compare thee to a summer’s day?

Thou art more lovely and more temperate.
Rough winds do shake the darling buds of May,
And summer’s lease hath all too short a date.
Sometime too hot the eye of heaven shines,
And often is his gold complexion dimmed;
And every fair from fair sometime declines”

In the very first line, Shakespeare poses a question if he should compare his beloved to a
summer’s day. But then he rejects this idea and says that his beloved is better than that. This is
an example of an extended simile. is an example of an extended simile.

D. Examples of Non-Conventional Forms of Literature

Free Verse
A free verse poem has no set meter; that is to say there is no rhyming scheme present, and
the poem doesn’t follow a set pattern. For some poets this characteristic serves as a handy tool for
the purpose of camouflaging their fluctuation of thoughts, whereas others think that it affects the
quality of work being presented.
After the Sea-Ship (By Walt Whitman)

“After the Sea-Ship—after the whistling winds;

After the white-gray sails, taut to their spars and ropes,
Below, a myriad, myriad waves, hastening, lifting up their necks,
Tending in ceaseless flow toward the track of the ship:
Waves of the ocean, bubbling and gurgling, blithely prying,
Waves, undulating waves—liquid, uneven, emulous waves,
Toward that whirling current, laughing and buoyant, with curves,
Where the great Vessel, sailing and tacking, displaced the surface…”

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 As can be seen from the stanza quoted above, there is an absence of rhyming effect and structure
in each verse.

Fog (By Carl Sandburg)

“The fog comes

on little cat feet.
It sits looking
over harbor and city
on silent haunches
and then moves on.”

Here, it can be observed that there is no form or rhyme scheme present in the verse.

Sources:
https://quillsliteracy.org/road-not-taken-robert-frost-poetry-explication-90/
https://literarydevices.net

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