Poetry 101

I just want to share tonight one of the poems I like mainly because it's vocab-friendly without having to compromise the depth of its message. The poem is written by W.H. Auden who, according to my professor, is gay. So without any further ado...

Funeral Blues

W.H. Auden

Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,

Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,

Silence the pianos and with muffled drum

Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.

Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead

Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead.

Put crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves,

Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves.

He was my North, my South, my East and West,

My working week and my Sunday rest,

My noon, my midnight, my talk, my song;

I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong.

The stars are not wanted now; put out every one,

Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun,

Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods;

For nothing now can ever come to any good.

What I like about the poem is how the persona is such a control freak. well to clear things up a little bit, the poem's about the death of the persona's loved one. And what he's doing is planning out the funeral for his loved one (who is also a guy because of the pronoun he).

The first stanza comes off as a person's attitude that wants to burst everyone's bubble just because his is. Misery loves company would probably best describe it. In the whole poem actually, he seems to demand from the whole world to mourn with him and to share with him his sorrow. Don't we all tend to act like this whenever our loved ones leave us? It's like we want the whole world to know how sad we are that if we could have it "scribbl[ed] on the sky," some of us would probably do that.

What's good about the poem is also the way the persona shows his love without using magniloquent speeches. He just had to say "He was my North, my South, my East and West,/My working week and my Sunday rest" and not the typical he was my universe and all that surrounds it blahblah to convey his pure and deep love for the dead man. It's simplicity while still managing to be romantic.

The last stanza is like a photoshoot and you're asking everyone to pack up everything and remove the set because everything's done already. "Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun, Pour away the ocean and sweep up the woods" isn't that so selfish? Seems like no one has the right to benefit from all these blessings because he said so. But it is very human. It's a usual human instinct whenever in extreme remorse.

So there. Just a short review of the poem. I like it because you don't need your dictionary to understand it. I am no english virtuoso and vocabulary is actually a weakness of mine. I speak the mathematical language more than I speak English. :D And what's best about the poem is that it does not try to be idealistic. the persona shows real human characteristics that he seems to not care about what other people feel because he wants all to sympathize with him. it does not try to rationalize his thoughts and try to be so ideal like "it's okay.. i am happy for other people and i hope they give me their support." Instead, it seems to be the type of person who would say in extreme cases "you, you don't deserve to be happy. gimme that fckin luxury you have. cry with me here. you don't deserve that."

The poem is something that all people can relate to because if not all, maybe most of us have already been in the same situation and have had the same thoughts and feelings as well.