fianl analysis

when i first read the poem i saw the poem solely in a light of death and decay, but through the process of studying it i was able to see the poem in a light of hope and forward movement. i only saw the poem as a poem of grief with no happy ending. but as i studied the poem and had others teach me about it i learned that it was uplifting with an important message.

when i first read the poem i came across a couple lines that i thought i completely understood, but in all reality didn’t. i didn’t understand what a flagellant was or why it would even be mentioned in the poem. when i looked up the definition of flagellant i became even more confused about why that term would be mentioned in the poem. eventually Jose explained it to me and how it represents the exhaustion the speaker has.

i also didn’t understand what cataracts were or what they had to do with the poem. by the end of the process though i understood that the speaker was old, i wasn’t aware of that at first. i got that cataracts were an eye disease having looked up the word, but i didn’t know what it was implying. i didn’t understand its relevance to the poem.  

interview

We both entered my room, he took his place perched on the corner of my bed and i took mine on my little stool in front of my desk. my steaming hot tea was placed in the middle of my dark wooden desk waiting for its contents to cool. the chromebook sat on the corner of the desk next to the bed, angled toward the stool i was sitting at. i pulled my phone from its little pouch in my backpack and found the little recording app i had on it to record our interview. i let Jose, my mom’s boyfriend, know that it had started recording and we can start. “the first question,” i started “doesn't even have to do with the poem itself, but with the name of the poem.” He prompted me to keep going. “the name of the poem is War Widow. what does the poem mean to you without reading the poem?”

“its written by some woman who lost her husband in some war.” he responded, his answer sounded almost a little too literal for what i was going for, as i was going for the symbolism and meaning behind it. but there wasn't a lot to go off of with just the title of the poem.  I educated him on the author’s gender a little bit, and that it was in reality, written by a man. I handed him the chromebook from my desk with the poem open for him to read. The room became quiet as he began to read. I became increasingly more aware of my old pendulum clock sitting firmly on my wall as it cheerfully sang its song of time. i watched the pendulum rock back and forth in time with the ticks and the tocks. my dog gently pushed my cracked door open enough for her little body to fit through. she explored my room, sniffing it as though it was the first time she had ever been in my room, though she often visited. i reached down from my stool to pet her and lifted her into my lap. i hugged her close, grateful for the cuddly warmth she provided. A short amount of time had passed my mom entered my room. She left the door wide open, a wide gaping hole that i prefer to be shut the majority of the time. The open door gave me a view of the basement hallway, with its bright white walls trying to mask the darkness. The old, tattered linoleum flooring that has been there for as long as i can remember. she had come with news of a video having completed downloading for my ASL class. i had spent the previous two hours working on downloading the video i needed, having lost all my work in the process. i felt a surge of relief with this news knowing i could finish my project. my mom offered to transcribe the interview for me to help out and make up for lost time with my other project. She made her way to the part of my bed buried in the corner. she leaned on the pillows i kept propped up for comfortable sitting when i didn't need my desk to work. Jose seemed completely unaware of the interactions around him. we spent a few more minutes in silence, my mom and I waiting for Jose to finish reading the poem. the clock kept its steady pace in our silence, once again, the only sound in the room. In the silence the gap left by my door seemed to grow and taunt me. I got up and shut the door locking of us in the comfortable cave known as my room. The sound of the clock proved to be, once again to only sound in the room. My mom tried to fill the silence with conversation about how to make up the work I had lost. we made a plan of how to go about that. Only a few more ticks of the clock kept Jose occupied with the poem and we were ready to interview.

He handed the computer back to me and I placed it in its original spot on the desk. I clicked the tab containing my questions . “What did you think of the poem?” I continued, using the second question on the list.

“I think it um,” he began, it was a relatively open question, requiring an answer with more thought and time put into it. “It wants to convey a message of decay and death, and its addressed to a woman who lost her husband in a war, I suppose”

“Addressed to, or addressed about?” I questioned, needing to be sure i heard him correctly

“addressed to” he confirmed “addressed to because it uses you. ‘you open the letter, you ride the elevator, you receive the letter.” I hadn't picked up on the addressed to piece of the poem and I took mental note of that.

My mom had fallen behind in her transcribing and asked for a repeat in what was just said so she could write it down.

I continued on with my second question “what did you notice about the poem?”

He paused, needing to think about this question as well. The fast paced ticking clock seemed to be pressuring him into answer, though he didn't perceive it this way. “I noticed,” he started with his answer “that if it weren't for the title, I wouldn't know what the poem was about.” he continued “Because it didn't even mention war, all that it mentions is a letter. But if it weren't for the title I wouldn't know what the letter was about.”

My mom’s quick fingers raced to keep up with his  quickened speaking pace.

“You know, the government telling this woman that her husband died during the war.”

“so you didn’t pick that up even from the telephone static?” i asked, mentioning the little things in the poem that i had originally thought to obviously state the war.

“no,” his answer was given quickly, with no hesitation in his answer “it could mean many different things.”

“what makes you think it was her husband?” i asked, trying to come up with a decent question off the top of my head

“because it said ‘widow’, ‘war widow’” he stated. i hung my head in realization of how obvious that answer was.

“is there anything that's confusing about the poem?” i asked having moved back to the written questions realizing they might be more helpful

“yes” the answer came quickly but the explanation took a little more time in being spoken, “what does she do for a living?” his answer made me giggle a little bit, what she does for a living seemed completely irrelevant to me. “Because,” he continued after hearing my giggle, “the last paragraph mentions she’s riding the elevator all day, non stop. so it makes me wonder, whether she... this is like some really old profession, one of those, elevator ‘bring people’ that just bring people up and down the elevator in the building, so i don’t know. It must be a very old poem, because i’m really puzzled about what her profession is.”

“its not that old of a poem” i stated, trying to answer his question on the age of the poem.

“maybe it refers to some person long dead” he suggested

I took another short break from the interview itself to check on my mom and how she was doing with the typing.

“is that the only thing that's confusing about the poem?” i continued my question

there was a pause filled with thinking. i set my dog down as she was panting from the head provided from my lap and the warm spring day.

“yes, there's another thing. the tea.” his confusion there was confusing to me, it had seemed normal when i had read the poem. “the tea and the cup. it seems like the cup is between the tea, when you would think that the tea would be within the cup. but the way it's phrased is kinda strange. So i didn't really understand that”

my mom interrupted again to catch up on writing.

“do you have any connection to the poem?” i continued when allowed. there was a long pause waiting for this answer. the clock once again made itself present in my conscious. its ticks and tocks calculating the length of the pause in answering. i reached down to pet my dog that had  started pestering Jose for attention. i tested my tea to see if it had cooled down enough to drink. it was no longer at a temperature that threatened to burn even through the cup, but it wasn't quite at a comfortable temperature yet. i breathed in its sweet, healing fumes, anticipating the time when its cool enough to drink.

finally, after quite the pause he answered “my job” he said almost as a question than an answer. “Because its really boring, sounds just as boring as that lady’s job riding the elevator up and down.” he continued “that's my connection to this poem. i haven’t lost anyone in a war so i have no idea what this means.” i found his answer to be almost comical. it was not quite the answer i was expecting.  

“you seem pretty stuck on that elevator” i stated thinking about how most of his answers focused on the elevator part of the poem.

“What emotions does the poem convey to you, other than the simple sadness and death?” I questioned.

“Loneliness, decay, oblivion.” He listed off the obvious emotions of the poem. “the first three paragraphs evoke very powerful emotions, in terms of everything decaying.” this answer heald no new information for me and i kinda laughed at how obvious the answer had been. “but the last one though,” he added “the last paragraph is very uplifting, because by her act of stopping the elevator between floors, she’s able to cheat death. she’s not reaching her destination.”

“wait, wait, wait,” my mom interjected, she needed the last few sentences to be re-stated.

“she hangs onto life” Jose helps her with her typing. “by stopping the elevator between floors, and in that way she’s cheating death”

“Cheating death?” i request more information in this area

“the metaphor is not reaching her destination. she’s prolonging the moment”

“why would she want to cheat death if her husbands dead?” i reach for more information and insight from him

“just to enjoy life. the fact that her husband is dead doesn't mean that she is. She still has her life.” he responded “after all she went through and all the decay and he old age, she’s still willing to live. prolonging the moment”

I found this to be inspiring and uplifting and had the desire to ask more of it, but no question came to me in time. i thought, the clock seemed to pressure me into thinking of something faster. ‘their waiting on you, think faster’ it said to me in my head. the prolonged moments of stress from the day were catching up to me in this moment. my head raced, looking for any possible question that would be worthy of asking.

“what did the uplifting-ness of the poem so impactful for you?” my pressured mind pulled the question from the available resources. i knew as i was asking it it was as pointless question, but i had asked it and might as well go with it.

“because its just the contrast with the rest of the poem. up until the last paragraph it’s pretty depressing, but then you get to the end of the poem and there is the contrast. its something positive in her life, something as lame as stopping the elevator in her boring job. And to her that's uplifting because she’s enjoying the moment.”

“do you think that's really important?” i prolonged the discussion

“oh yeah, i think its really important because she’s old, she’s lost her husband, she has a boring job, but she’s still enjoying life.”

“what makes you think she’s old?” her age kept coming up and i never saw anything about her age

“the cataracts” he bluntly answered

“what are cataracts?”

“Cataracts are a disease of the eye that develope usually in the older years”

“Willow stop it” i interrupted him as my dog had started pestering him even more for his attention. She had completely bored of my room and had moved on to demand love and attention.

“something i didn't understand,” i continued, “there is a line in the poem ‘like an old flagellant’ (Abani IV, xvi), what does that mean?”

“a flagellant is someone that whips his or her back with a whip”

“i had understood that much, but what does that have to do with the poem?”

“well, she doesn't even have the energy to whip herself. she’s so exhausted and drained by the loneliness and the decay and the death that she can’t even whip herself.”

“ok” i said, with my new understanding “that's all i need, i think that's enough to write my paper”

i was happy with all the new insight i had gathered, and excited and ready to write my paper. i reached down to pet my long neglected puppy and get the rest of my work done.

poem research

word definitions:
limned- depict or describe in paintings or words
cataracts-
debris- scattered fragments, usually from something destroyed
flagellant- people who whip themselves for religious or sexual purposes
whittled-carved from wood, reduced in size.

Author info:
Chris Abani is from Afikpo, Nigeria and was writing about from a very young age. he published his first book while he was still a teenager. his government thought his book was a plan to over throw the government and threw him in jail. after he was released he argued for the overthrow of the government and was jailed again. during this time in jail he went through months of solitary confinement, and other forms of torture. he eventually escaped Nigeria and moved to England and then later moved to the united states, his writing influenced by his traumatic experiences of his life.

Poem Analysis info:
at the begining of the poem the speaker picks up the phone but only hears static. the speaker wishes for their loved ones but know they're not there. when they trace the leaf, they're tracing memories. the distance of the memories seems clouded but still hasn't forgotten good times.
they know they have to move on in the third paragraph in order to get better, but there is still sorrow.
and in the last paragraph they have to learn to cope with death. and that lfe after death improves each day.




Works cited:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Chris_Abani
http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/chris-abani
http://chrisabani.com/about-chris/

Siddhartha essay

Siddhartha goes through a huge spiritual growth through the course of the book. He goes through many trials and tests but in the end he is a much better person than who he started out as. He becomes enlightened in the world through learning the things he did, and he let himself learn them. He transforms from being pride and arrogant to having the ability to listen and love.

An important lesson Siddhartha learned on his mission of life is the art of listening. To know how to listen is rare knowledge that Siddhartha does not know right away, and he has to spend time to learn this. He learns how to do this from the river. “Above all it taught him how to listen- how to listen with a quiet heart and waiting, open soul, without passion, without desire, without judgment, without opinion”(Hesse 90). The river teaches him the skill of listening. He learns how important to listen, and simply listen, without many other factors playing into the act, as it’s so easy to do. He learns the act that is as difficult to learn as is to do, But he does learn. He learns how listen and embraces his listening ability. “Siddhartha listened. He was now completely and utterly immersed in his listening…he felt he had now succeeded in learning how to listen” (Hesse 113). He completely learns how to listen. And he immerses himself in it, just listening. The art of knowing how to listen is important and he learns a lot from it. “…when he listened neither for the sorrow nor for the laughter, when he did not attach his soul to any one voice and enter into it with his ego but rather heard all of them, heard the whole, the oneness…”(Hesse 114). The art of listening has given him the ability to connect with the oneness of the world and completely be part of it, and understand it. Without being able to listen he would be unconnected and lost, but through listening, he learns the way of the world.

Through the course of the book Siddhartha was able to shed most of the pride he had started off with. He made prideful remarks to people he knew, and even the famous Buddha. “But now, according to you very same doctrine, this oneness and logical consistency of all things is nevertheless interrupted at one point; there is a tiny hole through which something strange is flowing into this world of oneness, something new…” (Hesse 29). During this point it was Siddhartha’s goal to point out an error in the Buddha’s teachings.  He is full of pride in this moment to think that he can deny the teachings that came to the Buddha. Through the course of his life, going through many trials, his pride is shed. And he loses this fatal flaw he once possessed. “He had been full of pride- always the cleverest, always the most eager, always a step ahead of others…” (Hesse 83). He comes to realize his own pride, and how it had held him back through the years.  This is a huge growth shown in Siddhartha and his relationship with the world.

Love is something Siddhartha had very little of in the beginning of the story, though over time he learned how to love the world and others. Near the begging of the book he claims that he can’t love while speaking with Kamala. “’I am like you. You too, do not love- how else could you practice love as an art? Perhaps people of our sort are incapable of love. The child people can love; that is their secret” (Hesse 63). While he is still in this state he cannot love. Love is something he has not experienced. Though he does not have it at the beginning he goes through a transformation and gains the ability to love, and love his son. “But he loved him and preferred the sorrow and worry of love to the happiness and peace he had known without the boy.” (Hesse 99). He learns to love the way the child people love, he learned to love someone more than himself. Even though the love of his son brings no joy, he loves him, and he prefers this feeling of love. It’s something he learns to do. As well as learning how to love others he learns how to love the world itself. “But what interests me is being able to love the world, not scorn it, not to hate it and hate myself, but to look at it and myself and all beings with love and admiration and reverence” (Hesse 123). Learning to love the world was hard for Siddhartha, and it was not something that came naturally to him. But in the end he was capable of loving the world. Siddhartha had to learn to love the world. And in the end he did.

Siddhartha goes through a lot to be enlightened and learn how to love, listen, and let go of his pride but he in the end does learn it. “He had died, and a new Siddhartha had awoken from sleep” (Hesse 83). Parts of him died, causing much pain and suffering, but he grew from that. And he learned. And he became one with the world. 

War Widow

War Widow
-Chris Abani

The telephone never rings. Still
you pick it up, smile into the static,
the breath of those you've loved; long dead.

The leaf you pick from the fall
rises and dips away with every ridge.
Fingers stiff from time, you trace.

Staring off into a distance limned
by cataracts and other collected debris,
you have forgotten none of the long-ago joy
of an ice-cream truck and its summer song.

Between the paving stones;
between tea, a cup, and the sound
of you pouring;
between the time you woke that morning
and the time when the letter came,
a tired sorrow: like and old flagellant
able only to tease with a weak sting.

Riding the elevator all day,
floor after floor after floor,
each stop some small victory whittled
from the hard stone of death, you smile.
they used to write epics about moments like this.

Sidhartha chapters 7-12

during the last chapters of the book Sidhartha, he grows extremely. he grows from being a prideful young boy running away from his father to a wise ferryman. he forgets everything he once knew among the child people but then he learns it all plus more from the river. this is also where he meets his mentor. he learns how to listen to the world and be one with it. he learns the unity of all things, and how to be. he eventually reaches enlightenment. after a long life of many trials he truly learns the way of the world.

when Sidhartha is an older man he makes the same mistake his father made, but he makes and even worse mistake. when his son is given to him and is under his care, he gives him everything, just as his father had done for him, that is, except for freedom. when Sidhartha was a young boy he wanted to go off and learn on his own what the world was and what the world meant, but because his father loved him so much he was resistant to letting him go. his father did come to realize that it was best to let him go though. when Sidhartha has his son though, he can't let go, and the son has to run away to get away. he doesn't realize that he put his son in the same trap he was once in. it takes a long time and a painful journey for Sidhartha to realize this, and learn to love his son so much he's willing to let him go, because he never learned that lesson when he was a boy.

Sidhartha chapters 1-6

In the beginning of Sidhartha he joins the Samna's. During his time with the Samna's he learns great skills such as how to think, wait and fast, that become useful to him later in life, but he has a goal to loose himself in the world. This is a very interesting way to look at life. it seems as though he's trying to kill and rid of something that cant die and wont leave. He's trying so hard to rid of himself that he forgets that his self is another essential part of existence. He's trying to loose himself so much in the world that he forgets that he is a part of the world as well. eventually he realizes that this isn't where he's supposed to be and he leaves, having learned much but still not being fulfilled.

he does all of this with his good friend, Govinda, who sticks with him even though he can be prideful. they become Samna's together. He follows him, making them almost seem attached at the hip for the first part of the story. sadly they detach when they encounter the Buda, that Govinda wants to follow but Sidhartha does not. at this point they part form each other. Govinda was a loyal friend to Sidhartha during the book.