Project 3

A broken man

I found a broken man on the side of the street

He was a sad and lonely man

I saw him eat dinner uses tears as seasoning

He was a depressed and heartbroken man

Someone had hurt him and taken his feelings to the grave

He was a shattered and apathetic man

No one knew his story but him and his crying shadow

He was a lifeless and wistful man

I saw him stager into the darkness of desperation

He was a broken man

Life lessons

Jack of all trades, master of none,

though oftentimes better than a master of one.

They say that once you repeat a thousand times

you’ll have mastered a theme.

Why would you take so long?

If you love life, think carpe diem.

You might say I’m wise

and that my mind is not stiffer,

but great minds think alike,

Though fools seldom differ.

I found a way

I never thought it would be so hard,

but I managed to find a way out

of that maze of words that I found myself in.

I was trapped and found myself confined

in the very book that I had decided to open.

I choose this and I will not be contained by it.

But, the words are so tempting

like a siren guiding me away from my normal

life and trapped in a body of water filled with

curiosity and mystery in a world I can only imagine.

I choose this, but I have chosen to supersede myself

into this character that I have discovered.

I found my way out, and I discovered the key.

I only managed to escape by finishing the conclusion

that had me so keen to finish the final words.

As I put down the jail I smile as my curiosity,

which lead to the longevity of my stay,

also lead the satisfaction I required.

ARTIST STATEMENT

Use the “Death of John O’Brien” as inspiration for my first poem as the first-person narrator describes a man and his life situation with the POV as the first-person POV narrating this man and what he is going through. The narrator creates a bleak tone for him through the use of He was a …. Man. The repetition is from other poems and it helps create a tone and personify the man. The first-person POV also helps create the scene and the setting from the speaker’s perspective. But, with the POV being in the first person it can make the man seem like it’s the speaker because the first-person speaker wouldn’t know how the man feels inside unless it was the first-person narrator describing himself as the man.

“Life lessons” is based on “Metaphors” by Sylvia Plath. “Metaphors” has a lot of long descriptive sentences that describe her pregnancy as metaphors, while in my poem I describe life in the form of phrases that are expanded upon.

“I found a way” was based on a first-person view of reading a book that kept the reader which was me interested and kept me reading. I focus on how the book has pulled me in and I can’t escape. I wanted to keep my voice intrigued in the story and a hopeless tone that I won’t escape, or that I didn’t want to escape. The first lines explain that I did escape but I wanted to still show that it was difficult like I explained in the first line. I liked writing a long poem like this in the first person because I could explain my story better and with more description from my perspective.

The major challenge I had while writing was that it was hard for me to figure out how to conclude a poem as I wanted to keep writing, but I didn’t want to be too repetitive and making the reader bored. The other challenge I had which was the biggest was that I had a major case of covid-19 that almost hospitalized me and took me out of school for a while where I could barely breathe and focus on anything. The timing was horrible to get covid, but I recovered and I was able to write and finished my project.

I am proud of my project and I feel like I was able to utilize my learning of POV and the styles of writing I have learned in this class. Some of these poems took a while to write and I had fun writing them.