War Poetry Response

In the poem Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most significant literary terms I found were repetition and imagery. “As your hands adjust your tie,/ people die.” This is an example of repetition because as the poem continues it constantly says “people die.” This helped me understand that in this poem there are people living their lives watching people all around them die. It shows that war is killing people after people non-stop. 

“As you sip your brand of scotch,/crush a roach or scratch your crotch,/ as your hands adjust your tie,/ people die.” This quote exemplifies imagery because it creates a picture of people doing everyday things, then dying. I think the author did this to really create an image in the reader's head to show people are dying everywhere during this war.

Overall the author's message in this poem is that people can’t live their lives without dying from this war.

In the poem camouflaging the chimera by Yusef Komunyakaa, the two most significant literary terms I found were imagery and metaphors. “We tied branches to our helmets./ We painted our faces and rifles,/ with mud from a riverbank.`` This quote shows imagery, because it helps the reader visualize what the characters are doing in this poem. This helps show the reader that people are trying to survive through this war. “Chameleons crawled our spines, changing from day/ to night: green to gold.” This quote shows an example of a metaphor because it’s comparing how the character is feeling to the feeling of a chameleon crawling on them. This helps the reader understand the book better by comparing it to chameleons crawling on them, it helps the reader picture how the characters are feeling.

Overall the message of this poem ios not to die, and the circle of life.

In the poem Camouflaging the Chimera by Yusef Komunyakaa, the two most significant literary terms I found were metaphor and simile.

“Chameleons crawled our spines” is an example of metaphor because it’s showing the comparison between camouflaging and the chameleons. This metaphor is used to add emphasis to the poem, creating imagery that improves the reader's experience. This helped me understand how camouflaging is important in war, and how the soldiers can become invisible for all the enemies, but on the other hand it helped to understand how they’re feeling when they’re hiding. The fear of being caught and killed just for the smallest wrong detail.

“Ready to spring the L-shaped ambush, as a world revolved under each man’s eyelid” is an example of simile, it compares the start of an ambush, with the world revolving. In my opinion this underlines how a single ambush, or an individual battle can reverse the results of a war. This simile has helped me to understand how the soldiers feel during the ambush, they are tenacious . During all the poem the author is describing a sedentary place, describing the camouflaging and the emotions felt by the soldiers. This simile is the end of the poem, it radically changes the whole written and leaves in the reader curiosity, not knowing what will happen at the soldiers during the ambush.

In the poem When I Am 19 I Was a Medic by D.F. BROWN, the two most significant literary terms I found were Understatement and Juxtaposition.

“I never mention the fun, our sense of humor embarasses me”, is an example of understatement because even though the author is talking about how the sense of humor embarrassed him, it does not explain the reasons why he’s annoyed. Also another  verse’s unknown mark is the word “us’: the author doesn’t explain who this term is referred to, and the reader can just imagine it. This literary device made me understand how during war, there is no time to stay with other people and have fun with them but just time to fight and kill. 

“Who is in front of me, who is behind me”, is an example of Juxtaposition it shows the huge differences between these similar words. In the first sentence the author describes the people who lead the war, they don't care about the death or injured people behind them, they only want to win it. On the other hand the “behind people” are left for dead by their people. This makes me understand how the war is destructive for all, and the amount of people that died at the hands of power-hungry people. 

In the poem Camouflaging the Chimera by Yusef Komunyakaa, the two most significant literary terms I found were Imagery and Personification. 

“We tied branches to our helmets/We painted our faces & rifles/with mud from a riverbank/ blades of grass hung from the pockets of our tiger suits.'' This is an example of imagery because the author used it to improve our experience and understanding of the poem by using their senses. This helped me understand what this character is doing and where they might be. It shows me that they could be in the woods in the middle of a war hiding from the enemy. 

“The river ran/through our bones. Small animals took refuge against our bodies,..” This is an example of personification because the author was making inanimate objects, like water and small animals, doing human like things. This also helped me understand what this character is going through and what is happening. 

In the poem Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most significant literary terms I found were Comparison and Repetition. 

“People die.” This quote is an example of Repitition because it is at the end of every section except the last one, stating each time that during a time of war, no matter what you are doing people are dying. 

“As you watch the athletes score,/ check your latest statement, or/kissing your child a lullaby,/people die.” This is an example of Comparison because it is comparing wathcing sports, checking a statment, and kissing your child, and no matter what people are still dying. This really tells you how bad war can be with people dying while other people accross the ocean are living their normal lives.

Poetry Responses 

In the poem Redeployment by Harold Nemerov, the two most significant literary terms I found were Imagery and Simile 

“Water still comes bloody from the tap/pet cat in his disorder vomits worms which crawl swiftly away”(1-2) is an example of Imagery because you can imagine what is happening in Your head as he is describing what he is going through. This helped me understand how war is impacting this character because he thinks war is a gory disgusting thing and how it makes people sick and unwell. It shows me how the author thinks war destroys people on the inside and outside.

“He keeps a solder's dead blue eyeballs/ hard as chalk and blue as skate”(8-9) is an example of Similarly because it is comparing the dead eyes of solder do a Skate which is a fish. This shows that the author thinks that war is a disgusting horrible thing that changes people and the way they act and how display their emotions. The overall message of the poem is that war is a horrible thing that takes things away from people and it makes people change.

In the poem Bosina Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most significant literary terms I found were Repetition and Paradox 

“Elect new apostles of neglect” (13-14) is an example of Paradox because we want people to take care of us and protect us but when we elect leaders they do the opposite and end up neglecting us. This helped me understand character because when we elect people we expect them to do things that help us succeed but they do things that make them happy and make them more money. This shows me that the author thinks that war is an everyday event that happens to everyone.

“People die” (line 4) is an example of repetition because at the end of almost every section it says people die. This helped us understand the character P.O.V because he explains the things that people do pretty much every day but as we are doing those normal everyday things people are dying. This shows me that the author thinks that war is a natural thing that happens every day just like us watching a game or kissing our loved ones good night. The overall message is that even after we die war will still carry on for far longer than we.

In the poem Redeployment by Harold Nemerov, the two most significant literary terms I found were Imagery and Juxtaposition. “I dressed in clean white clothes and went to bed.”(Nemerov,19) is an example of Juxtaposition because of its contrasting cleanliness and purity to war. Using white to show pureness and cleanliness helped me understand how war is dirty and dark in a sense. 

“But water still/ Comes bloody from the taps, and my pet cat/In his disorder vomits worms which crawl/ Swiftly away.”(Nemerov,1-4) This quote is an example of Imagery because the author is describing to the point you can picture it in your mind about war being bloody and dirty. The cat vomiting worms is imagery of how gross it was, and most likely did have men vomiting up worms because of being in non livible conditions. This poem to me is stating war destroys people on the inside, The man at first talks about the dirtiness and gross things about war and then at the end how he wore white in a sense to feel pure because war destroyed him. 

In the poem Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, The two most significant literacy terms I found were Repetition and paradox. “People die.”(Brodsky, 4- 4- 4- 4- 4- 4) This is an example of Repetition because at the end of every clause the author wrote people die, besides the very last clause. The first three lines talk about something to do with life but the last line is people die. In the end we all die, no matter who you are it’s inevitable and it’s all around us. 

“Time,whose sharp,blood-thirsty quill/ parts the killed from those who kill.”(Brodsky,25-26) This is an example of Paradox because the author is saying there is a division with whose blood-thirsty quill parts the killed from those who kill. The authors statement to me is who goes to heaven and who goes to hell. Where is the separation line that decides, because no matter what someone dies. 

In the poem Camouflaging the Chimera by Yusef Komunyakaa, the two most significant literary terms I found were Imagery and metaphor. “Blades of grass hung from the pockets/of our tiger suits.we wove/ ourselves into the terrain,/ content to be a hummingbird’s target.”(Komunyakaa, 4-7) This quote is an example of metaphor because the tiger suits represent bodies and the terrain. 

“We hugged bamboo & leaned/against a breeze off the river,/slow dragging with ghosts”(Komunyakaa,8-10) This quote is an example of imagery because it is saying that they are so slow they look dead. I can picture the hugging of bamboo with a breeze and looking dead because of how slow. This represents how war can go on for a very long time and continues even after death. 

In the poem Beautiful Wreckage by W.D Ehrhart, the two most significant literary terms I found were juxtaposition and repetition.“In Vietnamese, Con Thien means/place of angels. What if it really was/ instead of the place of rotting sandbags,/incoming heavy artillery, rats and mud.”(Ehrhart 13-16) this quote is an example of juxtaposition because it’s comparing the name of a place and its meaning to what it actually looks like. This helped me understand how war is impacting this character because he's trying to see the good in a bad situation or seeing the good in a place that looks bad. “What if I didn't shoot the old lady/running away from our patrol,/or the old man in the back of the head,/or the boy in the marketplace?”(Ehrhart 1-4) “what if '' is used in each section of the poem, this is repetition because he's saying what if this didn't happen and what if he didn't do that. This is significant because he's trying to imagine what would've happened if he didn't do certain things or if certain places were not what they seemed to be.
  Overall the message of the poem seems to be that you should try and see the good in a bad situation.

In the poem Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most significant literary terms I found were understatement and repetition. “As you sip your brand of scotch,/crush a roach or scratch your crotch/as your hand adjusts your tie,/people die”(Brodsky 1-4) this quote is an example of understatement because the narrator is taking something that is a big deal and making it seem like its nothing or not a big deal. This is significant because he is trying to get people to understand that while you are doing normal day-to-day things people are dying. “People die as you elect/new apostles of neglect,/self-restraint, ect.--whereby/people die.”(Brodsky 13-16) This repetition is important because the narrator wants people to understand that people are dying all the time and that this is what he went through while he was at war. This is significant because he wants people to know what it's like to come back from war and think about what's happening around the world.
  Overall the message of the poem is that you shouldn't take things for granted because there's bad stuff happening all around you.

In the poem “Beautiful Wreckage” by W.D Ehrhart the two most significant literary terms are POV and Imagery. “What if I didn’t shoot the old lady/ running away from our patrol,/ or the old man in the back of the head,/ or the boy in the marketplace?” (Ehrhart 1-4)  is a good example of POV because it puts us in the head of the person whom this poem is about. It forces us to see and endure the horrors this person had to go through and the emotions that they must have been feeling in this moment. “Gaffney didn’t get hit in the knee,/ Ames didn’t die in the river,/ Ski didn’t die in a medevac chopper.” (Ehrhart 10-12) shows imagery because it really puts us into the moment and puts an image in the readers head of all of this persons’ friends getting killed, getting engulfed in the horrors of war. Overall the message of this poem seems to be that even after leaving the battlefield the horrors that a soldier may endure can stick with them forever.

In the poem “Redeployment” by Harold Nemerov the 2 literary terms that are accentuated the most are Repetition, and Imagery. “They say the war is over” (Nemerov 1)  Is a great example of repetition, repeatedly mentioning the ending of the war really helps bring the idea of the whole poem, PTSD into perspective. A good example of Imagery in this poem would be “I know a man/ who keeps a pleasant souvenir, he keeps/ A soldier's dead eyeballs that he found somewhere– hard as chalk, and blue as skate.” (7-10) This very descriptive scene describes a thing that often happened during the Vietnam war, soldiers would harvest things like body parts as sort of trophies. This line really accentuates the barbaric tendencies that come from war.

In the poem “Beautiful Wreckage” by W.D Ehrhart the two most significant literary terms are POV and Imagery. “What if I didn’t shoot the old lady/ running away from our patrol,/ or the old man in the back of the head,/ or the boy in the marketplace?” (Ehrhart 1-4)  is a good example of POV because it puts us in the head of the person whom this poem is about. It forces us to see and endure the horrors this person had to go through and the emotions that they must have been feeling in this moment. “Gaffney didn’t get hit in the knee,/ Ames didn’t die in the river,/ Ski didn’t die in a medevac chopper.” (Ehrhart 10-12) shows imagery because it really puts us into the moment and puts an image in the readers head of all of this persons’ friends getting killed, getting engulfed in the horrors of war. Overall the message of this poem seems to be that even after leaving the battlefield the horrors that a soldier may endure can stick with them forever.

In the poem “Redeployment” by Harold Nemerov the 2 literary terms that are accentuated the most are Repetition, and Imagery. “They say the war is over” (Nemerov 1)  Is a great example of repetition, repeatedly mentioning the ending of the war really helps bring the idea of the whole poem, PTSD into perspective. A good example of Imagery in this poem would be “I know a man/ who keeps a pleasant souvenir, he keeps/ A soldier's dead eyeballs that he found somewhere– hard as chalk, and blue as skate.” (7-10) This very descriptive scene describes a thing that often happened during the Vietnam war, soldiers would harvest things like body parts as sort of trophies. This line really accentuates the barbaric tendencies that come from war.

poem 2

The poem “Beautiful wreckage” by “W.D. Ehrhart” has a bunch of literary devices, one of them is the title itself “Beautiful Wreckage” (W.D. 1)  which is a paradox because they contradict each other because most Wreckages aren't beautiful. The second literary device is Point of View, the poem Beautiful Wreckage. The author makes statements like “what if i didn't shoot the old lady…the old man in the back of the head…boy in the marketplace (W.D. Ehrhart 1-4) this quote shows the literary device used is pov because he is talking about his part in the war.  War is brutal on the mind as he was thinking back to what he did and if he didnt do it 

In the poem redeployment by Harold Nemerov the two most significant literary terms I found where P.O.V and imagery. 

“I took it quietly /enough”(Nemerov 16-17) if a example of P.O.V because it shows you who is talking this helps me understand the poem because I can better understand what the person is thinking or feeling. “And my pet cat/in his disorderly vomits worms”(Nemerov 2-3) this is an example of imagery because it helps you visualize what he is thinking about. This also helps you understand that every thing that is said in this poem is not really happening. The overall message of this poem is that war can mess with people minds. 

In the poem beautiful wreckage by W.B. EHRHART the two most significant literary terms I found were repetition and P.O.V.

 “Or what if the boy” (EHRHART 5) this is an example of repetition because through the poem they talk about what if, what if this didn't happen what if that didn’t happen, repetition does a good job of showing how the narrator is thinking what if without the repetition you wouldn't know about all the what ifs. “What if I didn’t shoot the old lady” (EHRHART 1) this is an example of P.O.V because you get to see who is telling the story. The P.O.V is really important to the poem because you get to hear what this person is thinking and what is going on in their mind. The overall message of the poem is war can cause you to overthink every thing. 

In the poem Beautiful Wreckage by W.D. EHRHART, the two most significant literary terms were the uses of Repetition and Imagery. 

“Or what if the boy-but he didn’t have a grenade” (#2) This quote is showing part of the repetition in the poem: the man telling the story talking about what he went through and if things were different while repeating what if. Thinking back to all the things that happened while he was deployed.

“Gaffney didn’t get hit in the knee, Ames didn’t die in the river, Ski didn’t die in the medevac chopper between Con Thien and Da Nang.” (#3) This shows Imagery of what happened while he was deployed, seeing his fellow troops going down in helicopters and dying in rivers. It is truly a horrible site that the author tells using imagery.

The overall meaning of this war poem is the same words in his repetition: what if? What if he never killed anyone in the army? What if he never saw those people die?  “What if none of it happened” (#6) He just wonders what if and tells of the trauma from overseas.

In the poem Beautiful Wreckage by W.D. Ehrhart, the most significant literary term I found was imagery. “Instead of the place of rotting sandbags, incoming heavy artillery, rats and mud.” That quote is an example of imagery because that description is really referring to how it’s the opposite of Heaven when you’re at war. This helped me understand how the war had an impact on the soldier's life and can compare what you see vs what he sees. The author's perspective on war is that it’s not beautiful at all. Rather it’s terrifying. 

In the poem of Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the most significant literary term was repetition. “by large, not knowing why, people die. …self-restraint, etc. –whereby people die. …where our cherubs dread to fly, people die. …kissing your child a lullaby, people die.” The quote from Bosnia Tune shows that when people are doing their daily life things people are dying and it repeats itself which is an example of repetition. This gave me that when I’m doing something, when people are doing something, people around the world are dying. The author’s perspective is that while we live our daily lives there is soldiers at risk for their lives that are dying for us and don’t seem to care

In the poem “Redeployment” by Harold Nemerov, the two most significant literary terms found were Simile and Juxtaposition. “Somewhere--hard as chalk, and blue as skate” (Nemerov 9), in this quote the Author talks about a man with a dead soldier's blue eyeball and how it is as blue as a skate. This is a simile because the author compares the color of the eyeball to the color of skate. “Enough. I tried to wash the dirt out of/ My hair and from under my fingernails,/I dressed in clean white clothes and went to bed” (Nemerov 17-19), this quote is an example of Juxtaposition. The author talks about how he cleaned himself up after the war but now that the war is over he is trying to cleanse himself of the war, wearing white clothes to try to bring the purity that he had before the war.  

In the poem “Beautiful Wreckage” by WD Ehrhart, the two most significant literary terms found were Imagery and Juxtaposition. “Gaffney didn’t get hit in the knee,/Ames didn’t die in the river, Ski/didn’t die in a medevac chopper/between Con Thien and Da Nang”(Ehrhart 9-12), this quote is an example of Imagery in the poem the author is thinking of the what if situations in war describing all of these people and how they died. This shows how PTSD and the guilt of war, holds with people even after the war is over. “In Vietnamese, Con Thien means/place of angels. What if it really was/instead of the place of rotting sandbags,/incoming heavy artillery, rats and mud” (13-16), this shows the Juxtaposition because even though Con Thien is the place of Angels, it could also be the place of great suffering and filth- the opposite of angels and holiness. The place that was supposed to be “a place of angels” now is turned into a place where there are rotting sandbags and rats and mud and the reader sees how war has turned this place from an amazing place to a place of death, destruction and despair.

In the poem _Beautiful Wreakage___ by _Ehrhart____, the two most significant literary terms I found were _imagery___ and __pov___. 

“What if i didn’t shoot the old lady” is an example of pov because it shows it right from the beginning that he is overthinking his own choices. He is looking at it from his perspective now and seems upset at what he did. This helped me understand how war impacted this character by making them take out their own problems by harming others. It shows me that the author thinks war can have a bad effect on people for the worst.  

In the poem _redeployment__ by _Nemerov___, the two most significant literary terms I found were _imagery___ and __simile___ “my pet cat in his disorder vomits worms which crawl swiftly away” is an example of imagery because it describes the details in what's happening in the moment and to the cat. Looking from his perspective he seems very intoit about what's happening to his pet. This poem helped me understand how war impacted this character by  showing how hes trying to be at peace yet he's still overthinking everything that goes on.

In the poem Bosnia tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most important literary terms I found were repetition and imagery.

(people die….people die…people die) is an example of repetition  because it is constantly repeated. It was always at the end of the paragraphs. This helps what the author understand on how war can kill a lot of people and how people think of war. It also makes me think about how many people die in war.

(As you sip your brand of scotch/crush a roach or scratch your crotch/as your hand adjusts your tie) is an example of imagery because it gives you an image about what they are saying. I feel like I am there with them.

In the poem redeployment by by Harold Nemerov, the two most important literary terms I found were imagery and personification

(They say the war is over. But water still/Comes bloody from the taps, and my pet cat/

In his disorder vomits worms which crawl/Swiftly away. Maybe they leave the house./These worms are white, and flecked with the cat’s blood.) This helps me understand what the authors think about how war can affect people and what it does to their brains and how some people that go to war need help more than others. It also makes me think on how people act like or could act like after going off the war and how bad physically and mentally people can get hurt.

(They get slightly drunk on DDT,) i think the author is saying what they look like they are drunk on ddt, but i think it means that they are dead because ddt kills insects instead of drunk they are dead and its makes me think that the man is seeing them move but they are actually dead

Redeployment

“They say the war is over. But water still/Comes bloody from the taps,”(Nemerov 1-2)--metaphor 

This quote shows the perspective of a person suffering from the wars by saying the water runs red, showing how war affects people even after the war. 

“And now there are cockroaches in the house,/They get slightly drunk on DDT,/Are fast, hard, shifty–can be drowned but not/Without you hold them under for quite some time./People say the Mexican kind can fly.(Nemerov 11-14)---perspective 

The quote shows the perspective of this past war vet and how risking his mind and body for his country got him nothing but a poor life as shown with the cockroaches in the house

The message the author was trying to give is that the soldiers that risked their lives to save their country, if they didn't die they would have to possible spend the rest of their lives with horrific memories not to mutation how a lot of soldiers were pretty poor after the war and some people dealing with the long lasting pain to there body and mind will probably not clean due to just trying to cope with the pain

The last Lie

“Across the sudden angle of the road’s curving I/could see her when she rose/Waving one hand on her swollen, bleeding head,/Wildly swinging her other hand/At the children who mobbed her,/who tried to take her food.(Weigl 8-13)---perspective

 We see the aftermath of the war and how it affects the kids and how the starving kids try to get the food from the girl to fight for their survival. Wounded and starving,  destined for death for reasons they new not

“I grit my teeth to myself to remember that girl/Smiling as she fought off her brothers and sisters. She laughed/as if she thought it were a joke”(Weigl 14-17)--perspective 

We see how the narrator feels for the kids but has the gritting of teeth is used to show sadness or anger showing how he does not like what is happening to the kids

Both quotes show that both sides both feel pain and have innocent people living in these war zones forced to suffer due to war,with it being so easy to ruin a life and to corrupt things seen as pure.Showing some of the evils of war, not to mention the guilt that some of the soldiers feel  and with enough it can break a person, getting them to do anything to not think about their wrongs and regrets

In the poem The last Lie by Bruce Weigl, The two most significant literary devices were imagery and simile. “ Raised up in the back of our open truck/ And threw a can of c-rations at a child.” ( Weigl, 2-3) This is an example of imagery because the words he used allowed me to imagine a person throwing some food at a child out of the back of a truck. This helped me understand the perspective of this poem is the harshness some people go through to just get food. “Fingered the edge of another can/ like it was the seam of a baseball.” ( Weigl, 20-21) This quote is an example of a simile because it's comparing how he's holding the can to how you hold a baseball. This helped me understand the perspective of war because it shows how people did what they had to do just to survive.

In the poem Bosnia Tune by Joseph Brodsky, the two most significant literary terms I found were Repetition and Paradox. “As your hand adjusts your tie, people die/caught in flames, by and large, not knowing why, people die” (Brodsky 3-7). This is the author showing that even though some people are living normal lives, there are people out there dying. What I took from this is that people are dying while I am in school having no problem and not fearing for my life, the world is crazy. Repetition consonance is used in this quote, acknowledging that every time you do something, anything, even just living your life, every second someone dies. It repeats identical or similar consonants.”People die as you elect new apostles of neglect” (Brodsky 12-13). The author is showing that we choose our leaders and the leaders we choose tend to neglect their people. I think this speaks for itself, we select leaders that neglect us. Paradox is used in this quote, it is both true and untrue. The quote is about how they select their leaders but they neglect their people. Overall the message of the poem is that war is pointless and no matter what, someone always dies. No cause can justify murder. 

In the poem Camouflaging the chimera by Yusef Komunyakaa, the two most significant literary terms I found were Imagery and Hyperbole. “We painted our faces and rifles with mud from a riverbank/blades of grass hung from our pockets of our tiger suits” (Komunyakaa 2-5). This shows that the author wanted you to see what he was writing, and that when you're a part of war you should be hidden very well. The message I got from this one is that in war you have to hid yourself well or you might not survive. We have a lot of imagery in this poem and this quote, when reading these lines you can easily picture the scenes and picture what they are doing, or look like. “As a world revolved under each man’s eyelid” (Komunyakaa 30-31). This shows that the world is still revolving even when you're not on it or can't see it. The message I got from this quote was that the world doesn't stop for no one. In this quote is a Hyperbole, it is exaggerating that even when you close your eyes the world still revolves but you just can't see it. Overall the message of the poem is that war can last for a very long time, even after death war still goes on.

Tearing Out Your Mind 

“War is a game that can be played with a smile on a face, but there would not be any laughter in a heart” (unknown). This basically means that war creates a paradox within the mind, tearing emotions and what was thought to be true to the point where even if a smile is present, darkness looms over the brain and inside the heart. Beautiful Mistakes by W.D Ehrhart eloquently focuses on that focal point and creates an aesthetically ugly story. 

What makes this poem as charming as it is are the two literary devices sprinkled throughout, more specifically, the portions including repetition that is surrounded with juxtaposition and metaphors. To explain their importance, without repetition cherried off with juxtaposition, the author’s main drift would not be punctuated enough to emphasize the reason why the author wrote this particular piece and their position about war. As for the metaphors, without them, the poem would not be as aesthetically pleasing, hooking, or entertaining and would result in unpopularity among the citizenry. Showcasing the literary terms, a quote that represents an important metaphor is, “What if it really was/instead of the place of rotting sandbags,/incoming heavy artillery, rats and mud/What if the angels were Amens and Ski/or the lady, the man, and the boy/and they lifted Gaffney out of the mud/and healed his shattered knee?“ (14-20). This specific quote contradicts the previous statements of the poem that highlighted the bad parts of the war and creates a metaphor that creates optimism from the point of view of the narrator of the story. This ties into the main theme of the poem, bolstering its perspective and underlining its importance to the framework of the poem. As for repetition, “What if I didn’t shoot the old lady/running away from our patrol/or the old man in the back of the head/or the boy in the marketplace?/…Would it all be a lie?/Would the wreckage be suddenly beautiful?” (Ehrhart, 1-4  and 22-23). This specific quote explains almost the entirety of the poem, making it a crucial part of its foundation and it forms the main theme of the poem. 

Expanding on the main idea of the poem, it was generated from the author’s perspective on war, that war can bring about heavy emotions, thoughts, and feelings that tear through one’s mind and understanding of a situation. Focusing on my perspective, after analyzing the text from the poem and previous war events and how I perceive their outcomes and causes, and effects, I agree with the author’s viewpoint on the war. Deepening that statement, war is essential for our protection, security, and the continuation of our society and the beliefs that the United States was built on. Even though that is an established fact, the effects that war has on our soldiers and soldiers apart of other countries’ defenses are horrific and mind-breaking. Almost all soldiers that were a part of our greatest wars suffer from PTSD and trauma-related illnesses. Their amputated and lost limbs and organs do not measure in comparison. They slowly learn to deal with their amputated and lost limbs, eventually being able to go about life without a problem. Their traumatic experiences stick with them through the rest of their lives. It breathes through their every move, it’s a parasite that makes their brain its home, and it changes their entire personality, demeanor, and outlook on life. In conclusion, war invades a person’s mind and rips out everything they thought they knew.

Continuous Struggle 

There are over seven billion people on this floating rock we call Earth, encircling and racing through space, covering near the reach of a thousand miles per hour. Each individual on this floating rock, using their own perspective, perceives things in a multitude of ways that may be similar, the same, or the complete opposite of their friends, family, or a complete stranger. Some spend their creative energy generated by this on writing poems for others to take into consideration, hopefully being able to associate with it and inspire them enough to remember their writings. 

A beautiful poem by Yusef Komunyakaa called Camouflaging the Chimera includes almost, if not all, literary devices in an eloquent manner. The most significant literary terms, in this author’s opinion, are imagery and point of view through the use of repetition. Looking at direction quotes that correlate with these literary devices, one states, “Blades of grass hung from the pockets/of our tiger suits. We wove ourselves into the terrain/content to be a hummingbird’s target” (4-7). This quote represents imagery that is created through the use of metaphors, specifically through the mention of bodies and terrain. Using imagery puts an image inside the brain, hence the name imagery. This is the first sign of imagery within the poem, so it lays a foundation for the rest of the text and can be used as an example, later on, to show how the poem progressed. The second quote explains, “We tied branches to our helmets/we painted our rifles and faces/with mud from the riverbank/we hugged bamboo and leaned/against a breeze off the river/slow-dragging with ghosts” (1-3 and 8-10). This quote includes a point of view through the constant repetition of the word “we”. Point of view tells the story from a specific narrator, laying down a foundation for the entire story. Using the point of view within a repeated matter deepens that point, creating more of an understanding inside the head of the reader. To continue on, if there were no point of view, the metaphors referring to the perspective of a soldier in war would completely abolish the entire meaning of the poem. As for the imagery, the imagery allows a unique and gripping perspective that describes the entirety of the poem. Without these, the poem would be plain, boring, and unpopular to the public. Overall, these two literary devices helped with laying the groundwork for the poem, acting as its framework, and were established as the basic information that the reader needed to understand the author’s perspective on war. 

Focusing on the author’s perspective, two themes can be extracted from the text. The main theme that’s represented the most is that even after death, war continues on. Thinking about this theme and putting myself into this situation, being tortured every second of every day while still breathing with the images and emotions that arise from war, then experiencing that chaotic and erratic affair after passing away and becoming basically just energy, is a frightful and chilling thing to think about. In short, I resonate with this theme because I have family members that experienced this, and their stories have chilled me to my core and finding this theme in another’s expressions is a sad thing to perceive and the author took that and wrote an amazing and eloquent poem that hit hard.