English 102
Keshishyan
Essay #2
Poetic Analysis
Topic (pick one):
In a carefully constructed, thesis-driven essay, analyze how poetic elements, such as tone,
personification, alliteration, rhyme, enjambment, simile, metaphor, and the type of poem
(narrative, dramatic, or lyric) contribute to the development of the theme in any two of the
following poems from the same section:
Love
“On Her Loving Two Equally” – Aphra
Behn (684)
“A Certain Lady” – Dorothy Parker (714)
“Song: To Lucasta, Going to the Wars” –
Richard Lovelace (724)
“Dover Beach” – Matthew Arnold (740)
“Sex without Love” – Sharon Olds (793)
“A Red, Red Rose” – Robert Burns (808)
“Shall I Compare Thee To a Summer’s
Day?” – William Shakespeare (810)
“The Raven” – Edgar Allan Poe (839)
“How Do I Love Thee?” – Elizabeth Barrett
Browning (894)
Self
“Hanging Fire” – Audre Lorde (719)
“We Real Cool” – Gwendolyn Brooks (720)
“Sympathy” – Paul Laurence Dunbar (773)
“Begotten” – Andrew Hudgins (785)
“In an Artist’s Studio” – Christina Rossetti
(895) * would also work in the “Love” and “Gender”
Category
“Harlem”
– Langston Hughes (1019)
Gender
“To the Ladies” – Mary, Lady Chudleigh
(724)
“The Changeling” – Judith Ortiz Cofer (728)
“Practicing” – Marie Howe (729)
“Daystar” – Rita Dove (736)
“Barbie Doll” – Marge Piercy (770)
“Marks” – Linda Pastan (806)
Homelands
“Africa” – Maya Angelou (757)
“Heaven” – Cathy Song (762)
“I Hear America Singing” – Walt Whitman
(865)
“Ode to the West Wind” – Percy Bysshe
Shelley (869)
“The Negro Speaks of Rivers” – Langston
Hughes (1020)
“I, Too” – Langston Hughes (1021)
Death
“Because I Could Not Stop for Death – “ –
Emily Dickinson (807)
“Do Not Go Gentle into that Good Night” –
Dylan Thomas (878)
“Myth” – Natasha Trethewey (879)
“Death” – John Donne (1082)
Keep in mind that this essay will not be merely a summary of the poem. Instead, it is an
argument about the work. You can look at a sample paper on page 940.
English 102
Keshishyan
Before You Begin
1. Read the poem closely several times.
2. Take Notes. And translate it to a “modern” text for a better understanding if you are dealing with Old English.
3. Read Scholarship and Literary Criticism of the work. Visit the Library website for research
http://www.lamission.edu/library/). You may also want to look up the Biographical Information of the poets you
work with (1108-1120).
Requirements
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4-6 pages
Make an assertion about the topic you choose (thesis statement) and support it with
strong evidence from the text through direct quotes, and with at least two secondary
sources.
MLA format (http://owl.english.purdue.edu/owl/resource/747/01/)
The final packet you submit should include one of your initial drafts with the peer review
sheets attached, and the final draft on top.
Due Dates
Draft is due on ________________ (Bring 3 copies for Peer Review and a copy of your intro for me)
FINAL DRAFT due on ______________________________