Response to Poetry Packet

I enjoyed the first two poems tremendously, the first one seemed to be a personal battle over becoming desensitized, and the second poem gave some clues as to why the author might be feeling as though they're "scared I won't feel a damn thing.'' While acknowledging this change is happening, the author feels compelled to fight it but simply can't.

The next poem appeared to be someone delving into a series of uncomfortable childhood memories. Starts out about her Father coming back from war, assorted views on innocence, her mean uncle. Just an odd bunch of vignettes of childhood memories.

The four page long poem seemed to be another series of vignettes, described with an innocence, and distance from the topics, which seemed very eerie. Some of the most unusual were the story of the pilot who had to search for the hidden airport. Or the story about how her mom broke her arm by packing down the garbage. I think they were told in a manner which purposely made the author seem distant, and never really connects any of the tragedies to her self in any format. She starts off rather mildly, pointing out the the cows "heat their own barn." When reading this one can't help but wonder how cold the cows get. Then later on is the brief story about the pilot who we must assume ran out of gas looking for the hidden airport. The author never touches on the victims of these scenarios, or informs us of how they turned out.

The next series of poems appear to have been written by an African-American poet in America prior to the civil-rights movement of the 60's. There is a series of sing-song poems that reveal a difficult existence, which morals and social conventions followed by whites at the time don't fit into.

The next poem I found interesting was "And What Do You Get." It starts out with a series of contradictions, created from removing sylllables from some common words. I thought that these plays on the words were very interesting, and rather enjoyed deciphering their meanings.