"The Third and Final Continent" by Jhumpa Lahiri

The Third and Final Continent is about an Indian man who left his home in Calcutta in order to make a better life for himself. He traveled to England for the first couple of years until his was told he must return to Calcutta for his arranged marriage to a woman named Mala. Soon after his marriage he accepted a job offered to him while he was in England at a library in Boston at MIT. He took it in order to support his new wife and himself and soon left for America where his new wife would soon follow. Being accustomed to the quiet of England, his first weeks in America were quite the culture shock. Everything was new to him: the food, the driving and roads, the rush everyone seemed to be in, and even more so the culture in itself. After spending a few weeks at the YMCA in the area of MIT he decides to rent a bedroom in the housing adds of the paper. For only $8 a week he could have a bedroom in the upstairs of an old woman's house. Over time, the young man becomes acquainted with his landlord and learns that she is over 1oo years old. This astounds him and he is even more amazed that she is left to live alone to take care of herself. Though he does not have to, the young man sits with the old woman, Mrs. Croft, every evening after work and they have a sort of routine that is repeated every time. Once she falls asleep, he retires to his room. He also never fails to treat the old woman with the utmost respect, enough so that Mrs. Croft refers to him as a "gentleman" to her daughter who visits every Sunday of the week. When it comes time for his wife to finally arrive in America when her passport and green card were ready, the young man informs the old woman as he pays her his last rent that he is moving. He finds a nice little and affordable apartment for him and his new wife to share. After she arrives, he discovers just how much Mala feels a stranger to him and it takes a while for him to get used to her. One evening he and his wife are walking and he takes her to the home of Mrs. Croft to show her where he first lived when he came to America. Mrs. Croft's daughter invites them in saying that her mother had slipped and asks if the would stay with her while she ran to the store. Mrs. Croft was still the "imperious" but respectable old woman he remembered. What he did not expect to discover from his visit with his old landlord was the growing affection for his wife. And with Mrs. Croft's approval, "She is a perfect lady!" the young man realizes he is lucky to have such a woman. In the end, the young couple were able to acclimate to their new home in America and most importantly find love and happiness in a marriage that started off as strangers. The couple were able to find "Home" on the third and final continent.

"What You Pawn I Will Redeem" by Sherman Alexie

This story is about a Native American man, whose name is Jackson Jackson, and who for most of his life has been a homeless drunk. One day he stumbles upon a pawnshop and in the window of the shop he recognizes his late grandmother's old powwow-dance regalia. Here is something that he has worth fighting for. He finally feels he has a purpose. The pawn shop owner makes a deal with Jackson stating that if he can produce $999 within twenty-four hours he will sell the regalia back to him. Jackson, who only has $5 to his name, which actually must be split with his two friends who are also Indian, agrees to the owner's bargain and sets out in search of a plan to earn almost $1000 by noon the next day. This story is about a man who must overcome his demons to respectfully earn what is rightfully his and how he will try and try again to succeed. However though he tries numerous times and accumulates various amounts of money, he cannot help but spend it on pleasures usually denied him. With his first $5 he spends it on alcohol for him and his friends in order to find "inspiration" on how to earn the money needed to regain his family heirloom. It continues to go downhill because with all money he does earn or is given he spends it immediately on either alcohol or food, which are not always spent on just himself, but other impoverished Native Americans in the area. One thing that Jackson has going for him is his strength in his culture, he is nearly always kind and respectful to those around him and he can find humor even in the rough times of his life. In the end, Jackson returns to the pawn shop at noon with again only $5 to his name. The pawn shop owner asks him "Is that the same five dollars from yesterday?" Jackson replies "No, it's different." "Did you work hard for this money?" "Yes." The owner "thinks about the possibilities" and disappears in the back of his shop then returns with Jackson's regalia. "Take it." "But I wanted to win it." "You did win it. Now, take it before I change my mind." Jackson took back what was rightfully his and discovered his family heritage renewed as he was able to finally "dance with [his] grandmother." He had finally found his self and had, rather unsteadily, won back his heritage.

"Dusting" by Rita Dove

The first time I read through this poem it took me a moment to realize that the title "Dusting" might possibly be referring to the search an older woman would be attempting to remember the name of a boy in her past. In order to remember the boy's name, she had to dust the cobwebs from her mind and bury deep into a memory of her youth. Perhaps the woman really is dusting and ironically trying to remember a time in her youth in which she would have to dig deep to recall. "Under her hand scrolls and crests gleam darker still. What was his name, that silly boy at the fair with the rifle booth?" This line may refer to what is beneath the "gray cloth" that "brings dark wood to life" and how it may have some how triggered a memory in which she tries to remember. It is a curious interpretation but a rather entertaining concept. I like to entertain the idea and imagine that the mind would need a little dusting as the person with whom it is in ages. It is an amusing thought that a brain would need a dusting in order to bring back memories in its host. "Not Michael-- something finer. Each dust stroke a deep breath and the canary in bloom." Here the narrator's mind is searching for the name of the "silly boy" and with each dust stroke she gradually uncovers more hints in her memories. And at the end of the poem, alas, the dust has been removed and a single name pops into her memory: "Maurice."

"Diving into the Wreck" by Adrienne Rich

Rich's poem "Diving into the Wreck" is brilliant in how it is so picturesque and realistic in description of underwater exploring through the eyes of the diver. It was easy to imagine a lone person stepping into diving gear then stepping rung to rung down into the dark abyss of the ocean. In the beginning of the poem, the narrator states that they do not have to do this like " Cousteau with his assiduous team/ aboard the sun-flooded schooner/ but here alone." The narrator only wants to explore the wreck and nothing more. Rich uses such detailed description of what the diver submerges under water to discover. A wreck of an old ship "the thing I came for:/ the wreck and not the story of the wreck/ the thing itself and not the myth/ the drowned face always staring/ toward the sun/ the evidence of damage/ work by salt and sway into this threadbare beauty/ the ribs of the disaster/ curving their assertion/ among the tentative haunters." The reader can easily picture the hauntingly beautiful appearance of the ship lost to the sea. "We are, I am, you are/ by cowardice or courage/ the one who find our way/ back to this scene/ carrying a knife, a camera/ a book of myths/ in which/ our names do not appear." These last nine lines of the poem I rather enjoy because of how the narrator tells how they are able to "go back" to a scene in which a living person has not viewed in ages but is still known in the book of myths to have existed. It is a scene of mystery and abandon in which the narrator took courage to discover in the depths of the ocean. It indeed takes courage to explore a ship wreck but even more so to do it alone.

"If We Must Die" By Claude McKay

This was a most intriguing and powerful poem because the reader, at least in my case, is unsure as to what the poet has the narrator fighting for. The poem is obviously about death and how the narrator would prefer to die than suffer through the hell they are in, but it does not provide the information as to where or what they are a part of. It begins with "If we must die—let it not be like hogs Hunted and penned in an inglorious spot." With this line could the narrator be describing what life was like for those who lived in a life of slavery? It is easy to understand that it was a life of fear and sorrow. Of living a life with no joy of being free. So many lines in this poem relate to being "penned," "outnumbered," and the feeling (or reality?) of being "pressed to the wall." These lines could definitely relate to slavery because those who were slaves were quite literally treated thus way. Many lines in this poem point towards the sadness and harsh life of being slave. However, this poem does not show the people backing down and accepting such a cruel defeat, it shows them rallying and gathering up the courage to fight for their freedom. "Like men we'll face the murderous, cowardly pack, Pressed to the wall, dying, but fighting back," is such a strong and honorable declaration because it shows the bravery of a person who is willing to die in order to achieve and gain what they are fighting for.


Word Count: 264 words

"A Jelly-Fish" by Marianne Moore

In Marianne Moore's short poem, "A Jelly-Fish," it is brilliant how she describes the beauty of the jelly fish. Moore describes the sea creatures in all of their beauty "Visible, invisible, a fluctuating charm." I love this line because it perfectly depicts how magical a jelly fish appears in real life. The fluid movements as they float in the ocean resembles that of a "fluctuating charm" and how they appear to be both visible and invisible at the same time is extraordinary. The line "an amber-tinctured amethyst inhabits it" could be describing the jelly fish's loose network of nerves. Jelly fish do not have brains, hearts or innards so besides its natural color, the only thing the amethyst could be is the network of nerves? The other bit of Moore's poem on jelly fish is how she captured the reality of how a person, upon seeing such a beautiful creature, would want to reach out and touch it. "You had meant to catch it, and it quivers; you abandon your intent." This line is great because it tells of the person attempting to reach out to touch the beautiful jelly fish, but hesitates and pulls back upon realizing that it is actually dangerous. Such a seemingly innocent creature is potentially deadly if it feels threatened. I really enjoyed this poem because it was so simple, beautiful, and easy to imagine. Marine life is phenomenal and interesting. It is easy to understand why Moore would choose such a fascinating creature to write a poem about. The jelly fish are stunning both appearance-wise and literally.

Word count: 257

"Poetry" by Marianne Moore

"Poetry" by Marianne Moore


For many poetry comes easily to them whether it is in writing it or understanding it. For me? Not so much. I have never been able to quickly follow reading or writing poetry. When I read Marianne Moore's poem titled "Poetry," the first four words are something I can relate too, "I, too, dislike it." Now don't get me wrong, it isn't necessarily that I dislike poetry more that I just have a little more difficult of a time trying to decipher/interpret it. In my interpretation, the poem continues by describing the narrator's discomfort in reading and understanding poetry. But the narrator also states that, though they "dislike" it, when they are "reading it, however, with a perfect contempt for it, one discovers in it after all, a place for the genuine." My translation of this is though they read poetry in contempt, the narrator finds their own meaning for the poem. Many different interpretations are listed in the poem to describe what the narrator feels the poem is trying to relate to readers. Whether it is random interpretations such as "the bat holding on upside down" to "the base-ball fan, the statistician" the narrator cannot help but "admire what we cannot understand." My final translation of the poem "Poetry" is that the narrator believes that poems, when understood, are pathways to the imagination. With this I can agree because like other works of literature, whether it is a short story or a novel, poetry is an excellent key to the world of imagination. I rather enjoyed this poem because, if my interpretation is correct, it helped me realize that I am not alone in attempting to comprehend the often-times "unintelligible" writings of poetry.


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