Poetry

     The two poems that I chose from Poetry 180 are Stanley Plumly's Birthday (poem 79) and Arlene Tribbia's Sure (poem 86). I was struck by both poems in different ways, but still touching themes of  memories and the passage of time. Birthday feels like reflecting about the passage of time. The imagery of the doors, the natural world and light gives the poem a dream-like quality to it. Almost as if the narrator is reliving the memories of their past life. Birthday is a poem that made me reflect in my own childhood and the moments that shaped them. On the other hand, Tribbia's Sure touches on very serious themes, but it feels like acknowledging the love a person feels for someone in a time when they are not the person that they used to be in the past. I think that this poem is very beautiful because it makes me empathize with the figure of the criminal. Just because someone has broken the law and is in prison now doesn't mean that they are not people, with lives and with people who still loves and thinks about them. 

    I chose these poems because they inspire me to think and to write about memories, and relationships. Both Birthday and Sure are poems that encourage me to pay attention to the small things that make a moment feel special. If I were to teach these poems in a class, I would ask the students to think about a moment in their lives that they hold dearly. What images come to their minds? How do you accept both the joy and the pain that memories can bring?