Poetry Paper
English 111
September 20, 2016
“the mother,” by Gwendolyn Brooks Poetry according to Webster is an arrangement of words, especially a rhythmical composition, sometimes rhymed, in a style more imaginative than ordinary speech. This is truly the foundation to poems and the meaning they carry behind them. Poems make you feel the passion and complex understanding of what is trying to be portrayed. When you read poetry you should read with the expectation that the writer is having a conversation with you. “the mother,” is an emotional and complex to understand poem about a very controversial topic: abortion: written by Gwendolyn Brooks. This poem portrays a very complex situation of a woman who had multiple abortions …show more content…
The definition of tone according to Webster is a quality, feeling, or attitude expressed by the words that someone uses in speaking or writing. This poem does a really good job at portraying the tone of voice being set forth by the speaker. Abortion is not an easy topic to talk about so the tone of voice is very important. Throughout the poem she made her tone of voice very clear by showing the strong emotions she felt through it. In the very first two line of the poem, “the mother” the speaker stated, “ Abortions will not let you forget / You remember the children you got that you did not get” (1-2). These two lines show the tone she has towards abortion and how it is something you will remember forever. Her saying the second line is pretty much saying that you will always remember but will never get to see the child you got but never came to be. Another example is when the speaker …show more content…
The poem had the speaker talking to either the audience or herself, which varied throughout the poem and did an excellent job at expressing what the poem was about. Although this poem was hard to break down with its poetic elements including rhymes, tone of voice, and imagery it was obvious that the overall theme of this poem was complexity and regretfulness of he speaker and author. The closing lines of the poem have a variety of feeling towards it but strongly portray the theme of this