Desire burns in our hearts and to associate desire with fire is expected. Destruction is cold, heartless, brutal and it again seems expected to associate it with ice. Is it a surprise that Frost brings the world to an end to make these simple points? Maybe the intended meaning is passion is what life is.
Tennyson wrote this poem in 1889, just three years before the end of a long life. A UK Poet Laureate for 42 years. The poem has often been interpreted as a reflection by Tennyson on his own life in anticipation of death approaching.
See review of Lou Holtz's book, "Winning Every Day" to see how he took the phrase "The strength of the Wolf is in the pack and the strength of the pack is in the wolf" and made it part of his philosophy.
Poe, wrote this poem as an adult, looking back at his life. He had felt alone since his youth and still did. As he looked back from "ev'ry depth of good and ill" it was still a mystery. For example look at these to lines from the Raven (reviewed in this section).
Most of Poe's memories are not happy and suggest loneliness.
Although it was written specially for one occasion - Bill Clinton's presidential inauguration in 1993 - it carries a universal message. Maya said of the poem: "In my work, in everything I do, I mean to say that we human beings are more alike than we are unalike, and to use that statement to break down the walls we set between ourselves because we are different."
"To a Mouse, on Turning Her Up in Her Nest With the Plough, November, 1785" Robert Burns, is said t have been ploughing in his fields when he accidentally destroyed a mouse's nest, which it needed to survive the winter. His brother wrote of this saying that composed the poem while still holding his plough. The poem inspired John Steinbeck in his Novel, Of Mice and Men.
Does Bad Poetry Spring from Genuine Feeling or is it just Sincere?
Oscar Wilde said that "All bad poetry springs from genuine feeling. To be natural is to be obvious, and to be obvious is to be inartistic. Harold Bloom used this phrase saying instead that "All Bad Poetry is Sincere." Bloom was justifying why Maya Angelou was not included in his big list at the back of his book or among the 26 authors that made up what he felt was the main influence for "Western Canon" in his book of the same name.
He added that Angelou thoughts were "sincere" but in his own view lacked aesthetic accomplishment. Bloom's conclusion seems to leave us with the question "What does if mean to be a writer?"
Must we really write about things of value? Who defines value? Bloom's real reasons for leaving Angelou off his list may be the political influence she has within what she says and he does admit that is part of the reason? See more on Bloom and the "Western Canon" under the review section.
A roving life whose theme has been "Goodbye"
A shadow on the road, a thing astray.
What dim ancestral heritage is mine.
That now awakens in my blood regret?
But cannot quite recall or quite forget?
This was considered by L'Amour to be one of his best poems and among those he in the book, Smoke From This Altar. It was his first published book; before then he hadn't had much luck with his other writings.
Rintrah is considered to be part of William Blake's myth logy who appears in this poem as a just man righteously expressing wrath. Blake felt that good and evil were just different influences we experienced and part of different energies that we had to experience as part of our life.
This love triangle pretends to be detached, but is instead cynical with expected bad results. Selfless adoration and shameful lust battle with each other to find their home in the character of the poet.
How would this poem apply if it was intended to be a female poet who had the two loves? It is just a given that Shakespeare is telling us about a man's two loves.
It pretends that the uncertainty of the relationship between the poet and his two loves is uncertain but the poem evolves to the ending where the lust of the bad angel likely will win.
*"Surprised by Joy by C.S. Lewis" is an allusion to this poem. The poem was Wordsworth thoughts following the death of a beloved daughter.