Squares and Angles?

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

Squares and Angles.  Storni.  Not being a huge fan of math I was wondering what a poem with that title could do for me, but as I started reading my doubts melted away.  The image that this short and simple poem puts into my mind is one that is intriguing yet relatable.

As the world becomes more and more "blended", men going out to work every day, women staying with the kids one would go crazy living in this circle.  This poem is trying to mock suburbia as more Americans are migrating to this world.  I really enjoy Storni's work as it challenges her reader to take a look at their lives and make them wonder if they are living as they hope.  She sheds light on the "norms" of society (mainly women's rights) and speaks of change towards a better and equal world.

"Squares and Angles" is a very nice puzzle that is easily put together by thinking. The gaps that Storni leaves for her readers to fill, allows them to think in a way to challenge change in the world.

Yours in Writing,
Hailey Browne

Oh the Wonders of Love

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

I'm not really sure if most people understand this about me.  Maybe its because I don't really appear as a softy or that I play hockey, who knows.  But I am a huge sucker for a romantic poem. I fell in love with Tagore's "No. 5" which I wrote about in my last post, but another poem that has tugged at my heart strings and stayed in my mind is Neruda's poem, "Tonight I can Write".

Now not all love poems have to be about the warm fuzzy feeling that people get when they are in love, it can also be the agonizing pain when that love is gone.  The tone throughout this poem is not extremely sad but you can sense the despair that Neruda feels.  This piece he is voicing his discontent of his lovers absence from his life and her lack of love for him.  He is unaware the feeling that he has for his lover and the feelings that she has for him in return.  He jumps back in forth between "I love her", "I don't love her", and "maybe I do love her".  It is a very chaotic feel which is exactly what happens when one is in love.

I really enjoy when poets write about humanly feelings as it is a great way to relate and connect to the poem.  Poems like this have a deeper impact, to me at least.  Although it is interesting and entertaining to decipher deeper meanings behind a more cryptic poem, having a nice straight forward poem that is about emotion and nothing more is a very nice balance.  I thoroughly enjoyed "Tonight I can Write" by Neruda.

Yours in Writing,
Hailey Browne

Release

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

In light of the essays we all handed in (hopefully), I have been thinking a lot about the poems and authors we have discussed.   In my Essay I explored Tagore and his wonderful poem "No. 5".  This poem was about Tagore's struggles as he dealt with the death of many members of his family in a short period of time.  Now there was just a short overview of the poem, but the reason for my essay and this blog is to talk about writing as an outlet.  As we have learned more and more about writers and their struggles everything from Wolfe and her suicide to Soyinka and his, Poems from Prison. 


I'm sure we've all done it, maybe not to the extent of a worlds best selling poem, but maybe through an email or a letter or a lesser selling poem in order to voice our feelings.  I know that when I am upset writing down the way I feel on a piece of paper makes me feel a lot better.

Through this class I hope we all master the skill on voice our opinions and feelings through paper and writing no matter how frustrated we get, writing can make us feel a little bit better.




Yours in Writing,
Hailey Browne

Mental Block

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

As I sit here today eating my breakfast thinking about English class, I feel a little bit shaken up from the last class I attended.  The class of Thursday April 12th 2012 was one to document in the books.
I had read the whole passage of Achebe envisioning the characters as I read with great detail.  To me the name Achebe sounded very much Asian, and to my surprise I found out he was in fact very.. not Asian.

The beat of the drums and all the talk of the ancient gods and traditions how could you not mistake it!  As we talked more and more about Okonkwo being a black man, I could not shake the vision of a big strong Asian man with a fu manchu.

In my mind:                                                                                                  Actual:
                       

As you can see it was quite a transition for the rest of the class to wrap my brain around the new look the characters in this story now had.   Now back to the actual story... I thought that we had made some steps forward in class when we talked about feminism and the role that women play, no longer being looked at as property but as equal, but this was not the case.  Women had gone back to their role of belonging to the husband and providing, cooking, and caring for the children.  There was a shining moment in the story during the trial when the elders said that "it was not brave to fight with a woman", but for the most part it was revolved around the wife beating, alpha male Okonkwo.

Although I did enjoy this story and the read went by quicker than others, I still will never fully appreciate a story where there is multiple woman beatings and guns fired in their direction.

Yours in writing,
Hailey Browne

First Blog!

Hello Fellow Bloggers,

Well, this is my first blog of the year.  In class we've explored into many realms of writing poems, short stories and fascinating authors.  We've discussed everything from suicides to pigs in the mud.  One of the areas or topics that really made my skin crawl and at times I did actually cringe, was the discussion of feminism.

Well obviously the fact that I'm a girl would probably be why this topic was so intriguing to me, but who wouldn't find it interesting to uncover the reasons as to why both the authors being studied committed suicide?  Even though Wolfe was a little bit loopy I really do appreciate everything that she has done in the strives to expanding the role of women in life, as well as Stourni although her "loopiness" before her death was justified by a horrible turn of events (her illness).

During the class discussions when Dr. Reed was poking fun at the way men of a past time thought and how women were treated, it really got me thinking.  There was a point in the class where I couldn't take it anymore and had to voice my opinions. Even though anyone in the 21st century living in America understands that women are equal it still troubles me that women in other parts of the world are still not granted this same respect.

I didn't really mean to turn this blog into a girl power sort of preach but I couldn't resist.

Yours in writing,
Hailey Browne