"Mid-Term Break" will soon be upon us

Neil Gaiman on his poetry, before reading "Instructions."

Don't you just hate when a text given you a perfectly adequate description of a piece? Out of the poems selected, I truly enjoyed "The Vacuum," but most of what I would say, the text said. "Mid-Term Break" is the poem I would choose after "The Vacuum." The intrigue in every stanza, slowly presents a family's sorrow. This poem is spoken like a short story. It releases details sparingly hitting the reader with the experiences of the speaker. "Counting the bells knelling classes to a close" (Line 2), screams of anticipation. He begins in the sick bay, and with the term coming to a break, he should find himself relieved. The first hint of peculiarity is his neighbors picking him up.

I have seen my father cry. It was rare, and it was always death. Before "He had always taken funerals in his stride" (Line 5) was spoken, I knew that this poem was about death. That line, matched with the neighbors picking up the speaker, narrows down that the deceased is in the narrator's immediate family. Finding the baby oblivious as he walks in, counters the father on the porch. There is an adult crying, and a child laughing, while the speaker has revealed little emotion, as if he is numbed by the experience. Three types of grief are paralleling three stages of life. The narrator is as unsure of how to deal with this death, as most college students are unsure on how to deal with any major happening. We are often numb.

The next few lines talk of the family/friends of the family. I have been to the funeral of an immediate family member, and it is embarrassing to have people speak of you and find yourself emptily consoled. Taking the narrators hand, the mother of the family sighs angrily, but without tears. Why is she not as openly distraught as the father? She is angry, which says that maybe this death could have been prevented. The corpse is brought to the house and the evening comes to an end.

As the poem concludes, the narrator visits the deceased. Upon entering the room the speaker sees that "snowdrops and candles soothed the bedside" (Lines 16-17). Snowdrops are white, which is often a symbol of purity, and candles of peace. Noting the paleness of the deceased also denotes purity. The only mark is a small bruise on his head. The narrator compares the small coffin that he is lying in to the bed he slept in, as if death is just a long sleep. The answer to the how is "the bumper knocked him clear," (Line 21)) saying a car had hit the little boy. The ultimate heartbreak is using the dimensions of the box, to define the young age of the child.

Works Cited:
Booth, Alison, and Kelly J. Mays. The Norton Introduction to Literature. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2011. Print.

The Rocky Road to Losing One's Innocence

Seeing as this was in The Dubliners, this song should hopefully get you in an Irish mood.

"Araby" is a story I hold quite dear, for it was my first introduction to Joyce. It immediately drew me in with promises of a bazaar and a magical evening, but bazaars and magic only exist in hopeful worlds, and this one often isn't. Bazaar's are one of my favorite literary settings, for they seem so alien and filled with magic. Even in a tale such as this one, I adore the use of a Bazaar, because can you really love something if you never see the dull, disenchanting side of it?

Haven't we all been here? Building up something to extraordinary heights in our minds until it will inevitably let us down? Joyce is a master at capturing the pains of aging and realizing that the world is often quite cruel. This young focalizer is like many young men of his age. Enjoying the pleasure or youth, and the times he get creating worlds with his friends, while also being curious as to the lives of adults and the stirrings that are beginning deep with him. Like many other tales, the narrator of course falls in deep infatuation with a girl that he barely knows, and hasn't even talked to. She suggests that she believes that the bazaar coming to town would be nice to attend, but alas she cannot go. He, of course, comes to her rescue, by offering to bring her a trinket from the bazaar. At this point everything will of course go against him. He will stop paying attention at school, his uncle will "forget" that he needs to go (though the lines, "I heard him talking to himself and heard the hallstand rocking when it had received the weight of his overcoat. I could interpret these signs." (332), says to me that his uncle is a drinker, and likely an alcoholic. He had been reminded earlier in the day about his nephew's wish to go to the bazaar, and then doesn't return home until very late with no excuse but "I forgot."), when he arrives everything will of course be closed, and in this case he will not achieve his goal. Instead he will be embittered.
So why do I like this story? I have read many a coming-of-age-story, and sometimes they end with a painful moment for the protagonist. Joyce captures, unlike many others, the actual pain of growing up. I love how when the shop girl comes over to him, the narrator notices, "[t]he tone of her voice was not encouraging; she seemed to have spoken to me out of a sense of duty." (333). That is a perfect description of the self doubt that I believe many young men face when reaching young adulthood. He was envious of the conversation she was sharing with two other gentlemen, and he could barely say three words. When the whole even left him disenchanted, it hurt him. I would venture a guess that it even made his whole "love affair" seem fairly empty and pitiful. "Gazing up into the darkness I saw myself as a creature driven and derided by vanity; and my eyes burned with anguish and anger," is his last swell of emotion he experience, and I have been there, and felt that (333). Joyce captured my teenage years, and it is always nice to remember where I cam from.


Works Cited: 
Booth, Alison, and Kelly J. Mays. The Norton Introduction to Literature. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2011. Print.