Crystal's Song

2020

foam:e, 2015

English Today, 2005

INSPIRE, Institute for Sustainable Practice, Innocation and Resource Effectiveness, University of Wales, Trinity Saint David, 2018

Winner of the Association for the Study of Literature & Environment UK-I’s annual essay competition, and presented as the Hay Book Festival’s INSPIRE lecture, 2018

2005

Erothanatos, 2021

Poems or lines from them can often say a great deal in few words. Compare, for example, Robert Frost’s two-line poem “The Span of Life”--“The old dog barks backwards without getting up. / I can remember when he was a pup.”--with Marcel Proust’s seven-volume novel, In Search of Lost Time. Among poems or lines that have had special meaning for me are Tennyson’s “Ulysses,” Aiken’s, “Music I Heard,” Traherne’s “Eden,” Yeats’ “Politics," and Hopkins’ “God’s Grandeur.” In past writings I have analyzed poets Carl Sandburg, W. H. Auden, and Mary Oliver in some depth, and have often turned to still others--like Auden, Shakespeare, Wordsworth, and Yeats--for wisdom and comfort. In that songs are often akin to poetry, I often turn to songs such as “A Love Until the End of Time,” sung by Plácido Domingo and Maureen McGovern, in order to replenish my spirit.

While the traits that Whitman is famous for - all encompassing humanism and positivity - are in vast supply in 'Song of Myself', this essay investigates how various parts of his poem aggressively contradict this reading. Using deconstruction and close-reading, I found a way to, in this brief work, completely redefine and re-evaluate Whitman's authorial purpose and attitude. This essay was notable in receiving an 85%.