This blog is a part of my classroom activity,

 This blog is a part of my classroom activity,

Modernist Poems :Thinking Activity - Identify modernist metaphors 

Task given by Dr. Dilip Barad.

  what is Modernist literature ?

 "Modernism” refers to the collective literary trend in the early twentieth century. The early-twentieth century writers broke up the traditional way of writing.

Characteristics of Modernist Literature:-

1. Complexity in structure
2. Fragmentation
3. Use of Negative words
4. Use of allusions and paradoxes
5. Use of myth and classical references
6. Experimentation with language and form
7. 
   

   Sexual perversion and spiritual  degradation
8. Art for Life's Sake
9. 
   

   Isolation
10. Effects of war
11. Disillusionment
12. Disinterested
13. Nothingness
14. Brokenness

Here are analyzed, and identify, modern  metaphor, symbols, images, from the given poem.

1. T. E. Hulme, ‘The Embankment'                     Once, in finesse of fiddles found I ecstasy,
   In a flash of gold heels on the hard pavement.
   Now see I
   That warmth’s the very stuff of poesy.
   Oh, God, make small
   The old star-eaten blanket of the sky,
   That I may fold it round me and in comfort lie.

This poem is the reflection of conditions of poor and homeless people. It's based on 'Art for life sake ' rather than 'Art for Art sake.' The writer here tried to show the real conditions of homeless people. So the basic concepts of poem based on Reality And  this poem baise on "fatal love and inevitable death".  Embankment is area well-known for homeless people sleeping rough. a fallen gentleman reflects on his past, not just men down on their luck but often by implication. those who had secured to sexual Temptation, and then subsequently relied, emotionally, or financially, and had treated stars. In hulme is out to questions our notions that the starry sky as beautiful and romantic and moth eaten blanket as squalid and on narrative but to the speaker freezing to death on London street the blanket is more immediately valuable and beautiful than the sky above him .
                     In other words good poetry deals with necessary and include only they necessary.

2- Joseph Campbell, ‘Darkness'    

       Darkness

        I stop to watch a star shine

        in the boghole -

        A star no longer, but a silver

         ribbon of light.

        I look at it and pass on.

One can find a beautiful use of modern image in this poem such as 'Boghole' and also the modern metaphor like 'Silver ribbon'. 

 In darkness everything is invisible. this poem was written during 20th century. there was great impact of two world wars. and perhaps darkness indicates the horror and terror of wars. in this condition poet wants the light. but there is no ultimate solution of darkness(War). it is just an illusion and that is 'Silver ribbon' so poet look at it and made a poem. 

3-Edward Storer, ‘Image’

Forsaken lovers,
       Burning to a chaste white moon
       Upon strange Pyres of loneliness and
       drought.

In this poem as well, poet uses aunty-archetype IMAGE. Generally, the moon is used as the connecting chain between two lovers. And it gives such piece of mind. But here, poet says that the lovers are burning to white moon. Though the intimate feelings are there between lovers, still they are forsaken and lonely

4-Ezra Pound, ‘In a Station of the Metro'.

    

  The apparition of these faces in the Crowd;

  Petals on a wet, black bough

              The poem very significantly compared the mechanical life of people with a machine. Station is a place where most of people meet every day but still there is not any relation between them. They are looking very strange as poet used metaphor that “petals on bough” petals grows on flower not on bough, and the black and wet bough suggests something wired and unlikely.
         In this poem black bough used as a symbol and it gives the poem very sad tone .

5-H. D. (Hilda Doolittle), ‘The Pool‘ 

Are you alive?

       I touch you

       You quiver trembling like a sea-fish

       I cover you with my net

       What are you- banded one?

The title ' The pool' gives us an image of stored water. Water symbolizes purity and rebirth. Here water is in pool it's not flowing which symbolises the rottenness of the civilization.

This poem reflects the lifelessness in the people who are lost in the monotonous life like a ' fish caught in net'.

Similar lines can be found in the poem "The Wasteland" by T.S.Eliot -By

"Are you alive or not?

Is there nothing in your head?" - Part 2 

6-Richard Aldington, ‘Insouciance‘ 

In and out of the dreary trenches

       Trudging cheerily under the stars

       I make for myself little poems

       Delicate as a flock of doves

       They fly away like white-winged

        Doves.

 In this poem poet used metaphors like dreary trenches, trudging cheerily, little poem, flock of doves etc. In this poem poet want to free from his responsibility and thats why he used the metaphor like white winged doves.

7-T. S. Eliot, ‘Morning at the Window‘

They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
 And along the trampled edges of the street
 I am aware of the damp souls of housemaid
 Sprouting despondently at area gates.
 The brown waves of fog toss up to me
  Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
 And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.

       In this poem many words used like “rattling,” damp soul”,”despondently”,”fog”,”twisted faces”,”fear”,”aimless”,.here in this poem Eliot has displayed the normal existence of people who are completely confined with the nature and they are working mechanically but not with energy .here the poet used new symbolic like plates and all those things and itself recommends their method for living.

8-William Carlos Williams, ‘The Red Wheelbarrow'

so much depends
 upon
a red wheel
barrow
 glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chicken.

               The poem has so much complexity, apparently the first line is not connected with the other lines of poem but it can be said that once which wheel was so useful is now cannot work because of rain water (connection of nature). The white chicken may be trying to hide from rain and wheel is also beside that chicken.        

          Red wheel, white chicken these all are symbols and through these poet try to say about human beings. It may be connected with white people and their life and for that he use white chicken.

9-Wallace Stevens, ‘Anecdote of the Jar‘

I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.
The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in air.
It took dominion everywhere.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.

This poem is about the state 'Tennessee' in united states of America. In this poem poet used such a metaphors like title - Anecdote of Jar, other like the jar cover hill, it was great and bare, bird or bush etc.  This poem talk about the superiority between art or man-made things and nature. Art may sometime be more beautiful than nature but it cannot be as creative as the nature.

10-E. E. Cummings, ‘l'

l(a  
le
af
fa
ll
s)
one
l
iness

In this poem poet captured the image of  leaves.Here compare fall of leaves with life of leaves compered life of people