The Famous Poetry Of Amy Lowell

The Famous Poetry Of Amy LowellWho was Amy Lowell? For the very few that do remember her, regard her as an obese, homosexual, and l binglely, unmarried woman that enjoyed smoking cigars and wearing mens shirts. However, we overlook the fact that she is well-known for bringing the Imagist movement to the United States and that she is solely responsible for the creation of the polyphonic prose. Also, no match slight discusses how she a broke free from societys standards of what a young woman should be Brought up in a prestigious, affluent household, she was taught how to be a young lady. beingness a Lowell daughter, she would then be married off at the age of seventeen, but no marriage proposal arrived for her that year. Since she had no right to an education, it was then that this seventeen-year-old female child began to educate herself by immersing herself in her fathers 17,000-volume library, where she discovered poet John Keats. From within the constraints of society, Lowell w as able to break away and discover her true self. She once said For books are to a greater extent than books, they are the life, the very heart and core of ages past, the reason why men worked and died, the essence and quintessence of their lives. Amy Lowell lived by this very idea. Her books and her poetry are what gave her life and meaning. through such, Lowell delved herself into the depths of nature and emotion as her key subjects when writing poetry.One specific quality of Lowells poetry was that she used sharp, clear language a vast with vivid mental imagery to make a statement. She saw no need in inserting vague and ambiguous references. To her the best poetry was that which flowed by itself as in everyday language. in that respect was no need to abide by the limitations that certain types of poetry brought about, such as Italian sonnets with their a-b-b-a format. Lowell is able to portray this very thought process attractively in Lilacs, which is one of the best represen tations of imagist poetry. The over whole poem has no hidden or deeper meaning to it and in fact, can be taken completely literally, which is one of the reasons it holds so strong among other imagist poetry. The poem begins with Lilacs,/ False Blue,/ White,/ Purple,/ Color of Lilac, which Lowell continues to repeat at the beginning of stanzas 2 and 4 as well. This repetition of the subject, allows the reader to refocus on the true exonerateic of the poem. At the same time, Lowell in the first stanza uses apostrophe to converse directly to the lilacs, referring to them as you. The speaker continues to state that the lilacs are everywhere in this New England, watching a deserted house, as well as settling sideways into the grass of an old road (21, 17, 18). Slowly, Lowell begins to focus less and less on the physical characteristics of the lilacs, but more so on what they are physically doing and what they are capable of doing, personifying the lilacs in the process. The lilacs are now standing by the pasture-bars to give the cows good milking, persuading the housewife that her dishpan was of silver, and flaunting the fragrance of its blossoms (28, 29, 31). Through these acts, the reader quickly sees the lilacs as benefiting the things and people around them. Finally towards thePut in resultant For the rest though, she continues to be just another poet lost in the depths of history.Lilacs,False sombre,White,Purple,Color of lilac,Your great puffs of flowersAre everywhere in this my New England.Among your heart-shaped leavesorange tree orioles hop like music-box birds and singTheir little weak soft songsIn the crooks of your branchesThe bright eyes of song sparrows sitting on spotted eggs mates restlessly through the light and shadowOf all Springs.Lilacs in dooryardsHolding quiet conversations with an early moonLilacs watching a deserted house subsiding sideways into the grass of an old roadLilacs, wind-beaten, staggering under a lopsided shock of bloomAbove a cellar dug into a hill.You are everywhere.You were everywhere.You tapped the window when the preacher preached his sermon,And ran along the road beside the boy going to school.You stood by the pasture-bars to give the cows good milking,You persuaded the housewife that her dishpan was of silver.And her husband an image of consummate(a) gold.You flaunted the fragrance of your blossomsThrough the wide doors of Custom Houses-You, and sandal-wood, and tea,Charging the noses of quill-driving clerksWhen a ship was in from China.You called to them Goose-quill men, goose-quill men,May is a month for flitting.Until they writhed on their high stoolsAnd wrote poetry on their letter-sheets behind the propped-up ledgers.Paradoxical New England clerks,Writing inventories in ledgers, reading the Song of Solomon at night,So many verses before bed-time,Because it was the Bible.The dead fed youAmid the slant stones of graveyards. sentinel ghosts who planted youCame in the nighttimeAnd let their thin hair blow through your clustered stems.You are of the green sea,And of the stone hills which reach a long distance.You are of elm-shaded streets with little shops where they sell kites and marbles,You are of great parks where every one walks and nobody is at home.You cover the blind sides of greenhousesAnd lean over the top to say a hurry-word through the glassTo your friends, the grapes, inside.Lilacs,False blue,White,Purple,Color of lilac,You have forgotten your Eastern origin,The veiled women with eyes like panthers,The swollen, aggressive turbans of jeweled pashas. straight off you are a very decent flower,A reticent flower,A curiously clear-cut, candid flower,Standing beside clean doorways,Friendly to a house-cat and a bitstock of spectacles,Making poetry out of a bit of moonlightAnd a hundred or two sharp blossoms.Maine knows you,Has for years and yearsNew Hampshire knows you,And mammyAnd Vermont.Cape Cod starts you along the beaches to Rhode IslandConnecticut takes you from a river to the sea.You are brighter than apples,Sweeter than tulips,You are the great flood of our soulsBursting above the leaf-shapes of our hearts,You are the smell of all Summers,The love of wives and children,The medical history of gardens of little children,You are State Houses and ChartersAnd the familiar treading of the foot to and fro on a road it knows.May is lilac here in New England,May is a thrush singing Sun up on a tip-top ash tree,May is white clouds behind pine-treesPuffed out and marching upon a blue sky.May is a green as no other,May is much sun through small leaves,May is soft earth,And apple-blossoms,And windows open to a southward Wind.May is full light wind of lilacFrom Canada to Narragansett Bay.Lilacs,False blue,White,Purple,Color of lilac.Heart-leaves of lilac all over New England,Roots of lilac under all the soil of New England,Lilac in me because I am New England,Because my roots are in it,Because my leaves are of it,Because my flowers are for it,Because it is my countryAnd I speak to it of itselfAnd sing of it with my own voiceSince certainly it is mine.