"The Memory of Elena" Analysis

The title is "The Memory of Elena" and this poem is most likely about the memories of a woman named Elena.

We spend our morning
in the flower stalls counting
the dark tongues of bells
that hang from ropes waiting 
for the silence of an hour.
We spend our morning in the flower stalls counting the stamen of the flowers hanging from ropes waiting for an hour of silence.
We find a table, ask for paella,
cold soup and wine, where a calm 
light trembles years behind us.
We find a table, ask for paella which is the national dish of Spain, cold soup and wine, where years ago, lights were on behind us.
In Buenos Aires only three
years ago, it was the last time his hand 
slipped into her dress, with pearls 
cooling her throat and bells like
these, chipping at the night—
Three years ago, in Buenos Aires, it was the last time his hand slipped into her dress, she was wearing pearls around her throat and the wedding bells were ringing.

As she talks, the hollow
clopping of a horse, the sound 
of bones touched together.
As she talks, the sound of the horses clopping blends in with her voice as well as those of bones touching together.

The paella comes, a bed of rice 
and camarones, fingers and shells, 
the lips of those whose lips
have been removed, mussels
the soft blue of a leg socket.
The paella has: rice, camarones (shrimp), the shells of shrimps and fingers, and lipis of those whose lips have been removed, mussels and leg sockets.

This is not paella, this is what
has become of those who remained 
in Buenos Aires. This is the ring 
of a rifle report on the stones, 
her hand over her mouth,
her husband falling against her.
This is not the dish paella, but rather what has become of the people who remained in Buenos Aires. This is the barrel of the rifle on top of the stones, her hand over her mouth, her husband falling against her because he got shot.

These are the flowers we bought 
this morning, the dahlias tossed
on his grave and bells
waiting with their tongues cut out 
for this particular silence.

The dahlias are the flowers we brought this morning are tossed on his grave and bells waiting to ring but they cannot.

In this poem, the author utilizes personification, imagery, and symbolism. The author personifies the bells in the last stanza, "... and bells waiting with their tongues cut out..." Bells do not wait, only humans wait and they do not have tongues. The bells in the line mentioned above is also a symbol. It is a symbol of silence, which is also ironic because bells are not usually silence; however these have had their tongues cut out. Therefore, they were forcefully quieted. The author used imagery throughout the poem to paint a picture of the paella dish and her husband being shot. "The paella comes, a bed of rice and camarones, fingers and shells, the lips of those whose lips have been removed, mussels the soft blue of a leg socket." This line gives the readers an image in their minds as to what the dish looks like and the significance it holds to the author.

The tone is nostalgic throughout as the author reminisces about Buenos Aires, paella, her husband, their memories, and his death. "In Buenos Aires three years ago, it was the last time..." She is remembering the events of what happened: the dish she ordered, the last time her husband slipped his hand in her dress, the rifle, and her husband falling against her. The tone is nostalgic and mourning... Mourning over the loss of her husband who was killed in Buenos Aires.

In the beginning, the tone was very nostalgic as she says "In Buenos Aires, only three years ago..." However, as the poem progressed, it began to grow gloomy and morbid as she describes that it is the last time. When she begins to describe the paella, the tone shifts to a morbid atmosphere. "The paella comes, a bed of rice and camarones, fingers and shells, the lips of those whose lips have been removed, mussels the soft blue of a leg socket." It begins with her describing the dish, but further along the sentence, there is a darker tone as she includes "fingers" , "lips" , and "leg socket." Even without knowing anything about the dish, we can assume that those are not the ingredients that is used. They are human parts that she adds into this line to give it a morbid mood.

The title is "The Memory of Elena," and it is about the memory of a woman named Elena whose husband died in Buenos Aires. The poem is to being attention to the violence in Buenos Aires because a result of it was the death of someone's loved one.

The poem is about Elena's recollection of Buenos Aires. The theme is violence and silence. The theme that the author is conveying in this poem is about the violence within cities and countries and how people who witnessed it are silenced, but they shouldn't be. Witnesses of tragedies should have a chance to speak of their experiences in order to bring into light, a larger issue. Such as this poem is about the experience of Elena, whose husband died. This brings forth light onto the subject of violence within cities.







Works Cited:

Forché, Carolyn. “The Memory of Elena by Carolyn Forché.” Poetry Foundation, Poetry Foundation,
www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47217/the-memory-of-elena.

"The Garden Shukkei-En" Analysis

The title of the poem is"The Garden Shukkei-En" and the poem is probably regarding the garden.

"By way of a vanished bridge we cross this river
as a cloud of lifted snow would ascend a mountain."
We will use a bridge that has disappeared in order to cross this river just like a cloud with snow would climb a mountain.

"She has always been afraid to come here."
She was always afraid to come here.

"It is the river she most
remembers, the living
and the dead both crying for help."
She remembers the river the most. The living and the dead are crying for help.

"A world that allowed neither tears nor lamentation."
A world that does not allow tears nor weeping.

"The matsu trees brush her hair as she passes
beneath them, as do the shining strands of barbed wire."
Her hair is caught in the tree and barbed wire as she walks by.

"Where this lake is, there was a lake,
where these black pine grow, there grew black pine."
There is a lake here and black pine grows here.

"Where there is no teahouse I see a wooden teahouse
and the corpses of those who slept in it."
I see a teahouse where there is none, with the dead who are sleeping in it.

"On the opposite bank of the Ota, a weeping willow
etches its memory of their faces into the water."
On the river, the weeping willow reflects their faces onto the water.

"Where light touches the face, the character for heart is written."
When the light is on your face, the word heart is there.

"She strokes a burnt trunk wrapped in straw:
I was weak and my skin hung from my fingertips like cloth"
She touches a part of the burnt trunk that is wrapped in straw. My hand was weak and my skin felt like it was going to fall off.

"Do you think for a moment we were human beings to them?"
Do you think for a moment that they considered us, equally, as human beings?

"She comes to the stone angel holding paper cranes.
Not an angel, but a woman where she once had been,
who walks through the garden Shukkei-en
calling the carp to the surface by clapping her hands."
She goes to the statue of the stone angel holding paper cranes. The angel is not an angel, but it was a person who was there before. Who walked through the garden calling the fish to the surface by clapping her hands.

"Do Americans think of us?"
Do the Americans think of us?

"So she began as we squatted over the toilets:
If you want, I'll tell you, but nothing I say will be enough."
As we squatted over the toilets, she began to talk. She said, "If you want, I'll tell you, but nothing I say will be enough."

"We tried to dress our burns with vegetable oil."
We are using vegetable oil to dress our burns.

"Her hair is the white froth of rice rising up kettlesides, her mind also.
In the postwar years she thought deeply about how to live."
Her hair is white and her mind is foggy. After the war, she thinks about how to proceed with life.

"The common greeting dozo-yiroshku is please take care of me.
All hibakusha still alive were children then."
The common greeting is please take care of me. All hibakusha, those who survived the atomic bombings of Hiroshima or Nagasaki, were children when it happened.

"A cemetery seen from the air is a child's city."
A cemetery seen from up high is like a child's city because it is so small.

"I don't like this particular red flower because
it reminds me of a woman's brain crushed under a roof."
I don't like this red flower because it reminds me of a woman's brain, who was crushed under a roof.

"Perhaps my language is too precise, and therefore difficult to understand?"
Perhaps I am too detailed, which could be making it difficult for you to comprehend.

"We have not, all these years, felt what you call happiness.
But at times, with good fortune, we experience something close.
As our life resembles life, and this garden the garden.
And in the silence surrounding what happened to us"
Through all these years, we have not felt happiness. However, there are times of good fortune in which we experience something close to happiness. Our life resembles life and this garden resembles a garden. The silence about the details of what happened to us

"it is the bell to awaken God that we've heard ringing."
is the bell ringing to awaken God.

The author uses personification and imagery throughout the poem. An example would be the first 2 lines when she is personifying the cloud and describing it in order to convey to the audience the image of it ascending a mountain. "... as a cloud of lifted snow would ascend a mountain." Alliteration is used in part of the poem to emphasize her remembering the past while incorporating it into the future. "Where this is... Where there is..." She also uses rhetorical questions to invoke in the readers, guilt, and sympathy as they too try to answer the question. "Do you think for a moment we are human beings to them?"

The tone of the poem was heavy-hearted. Her diction conveyed a dark mood throughout the poem. She uses words such as "dead", "crying", "tears", "corpses" in her poem in order to the emphasize the negativity and distress of the experience that the person who is telling the story, went through. The mood is also gloomy and nostalgic as she remembers of how the garden used to be before, but because it is incorporated in the future as well, she knows that what was, is no longer, and what shall be, is her future. She remembers of the places and people that used to be there, and she knows of where they are now. Gone. That is her future. One without the teahouse, or the people who would sit in there. "Where there is no teahouse I see a wooden teahouse and the corpses of those who slept in it."

At the end of the poem, her language shifted. Throughout the poem, she provided concrete language to describe the bombing and her experience; however, at the end, when she is asked to describe how she is after the bombing, she provides a vague description. "We have not, all these years, felt what you call happiness. But at times, with good fortune, we experience something close."

"The Garden of Shukkei-En" The title is about the historic Japanese garden in Hiroshima, Japan. Hiroshima was bombed by the United States and this park was collateral damage.

The themes of this poem are violence, inhumanity, and memories. "Do you think for a moment we were human beings to them?" Because of the atomic bombing, many people died and those who survived will forever contain in their memories the tragic incident. There will be millions of innocent lives that are lost forever, some just born to those who have lived a long life. The inhumanity of the people who decided to bomb the innocent civilians is questioned.They may have ended a war, but lost millions of lives as well as caused in those who survived, PTSD.





Works Cited:

Forché, Carolyn. “The Garden Shukkei-En.” PoemHunter.com, 13 Jan. 2003,
      www.poemhunter.com/poem/the-garden-shukkei-en/.

Biography

Carolyn Forché was born in Detroit, Michigan on April 28, 1950. She is a poet, teacher, activist, translator, teacher, political poet, human rights advocate. She calls herself a "poet of witness" because she "... has witnessed, thought about, and put into poetry some of the most devastating events of the twentieth-century world history." (Poetry foundation) She advocates the importance of human rights within her poems. Carolyn Forché has won many awards and grants and is currently "...director of the Lannan Center for Poetry and Poetics and holds the Lannan Chair in Poetry at Georgetown University in Washington, D.C." (poet.org)


Sources Cited:

Brunner, Eric. "Carolyn Forché's Life and Career." Modern American Poetry. N.p., n.d. Web. 24 Sept.     2017. <http://www.english.illinois.edu/maps/poets/a_f/forche/life.htm>.

"Carolyn Forché." Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation, n.d. Web. 24 Sept. 2017.
    <https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/carolyn-forche>.

"Carolyn Forché." Poets.org. Academy of American Poets, 29 Apr. 2016. Web. 24 Sept. 2017.    
    <https://www.poets.org/poetsorg/poet/carolyn-forch%C3%A9>.

Introduction

My name is Duyen Huynh and the poet I chose is Carolyn Forché. I chose her because she raises awareness towards the problems that are around us through her poems which gives the readers a first-person perspective of an event. We are able to view events that happened even before we were born, and we get to experience the emotions and thoughts of a person who lived through it. The themes of her poems center around humanity and human rights; as well as the lives of immigrants living among us and how they are affected by problems from their homeland or place of current residency.

Usner, Don J. "Courtesy of Blue Flower Arts." Poetry Foundation, https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/carolyn-forche.