Metaphor: "At the Hospital" by David Ferry

David Ferry, a man with a creative brain that spills out beautiful poetry. Ferry is not only an American poet but also a translator and educator. He recently won the National Book Award for Poetry (2012) as well as the Bobbitt National Prize for Poetry (2000).

At the Hospital

 

She was the sentence the cancer spoke at last,

Its blurred grammar finally clarified.

 

David Ferry’s poem at the hospital is short yet contains a plethora of meaning. The poem’s effectiveness depends on its brevity. On the surface, the poem alludes to a death that was long awaited. The comparison that Ferry makes is between a person with cancer and a simple, short sentence. The hidden meaning of the poem is the brevity of life and how quick death itself can come upon us. The person that the speaker presents to us in the poem is not a human at all but is a simply sentence. The speaker does not compare the person to a novel or even a paragraph but simply one sentence. This sentence is ironically about the death sentence of cancer. The speaker concludes with “grammar finally clarified” (Line 2) meaning that the person’s death had cleared the uncertainty if the person would beat cancer or not. The word grammar here represents the questions of family, friends, and even the deceased on how it would end.

This metaphor of death is supported with irony and shock. The speaker does not show signs of remorse and remains completely detached; because of this the death shocks us. Ferry’s title “At the Hospital” even produces irony by associating hospitals not with health but instead with death. What is also ironic about this poem is the clarity that makes us feel remorse and possibly even regret for knowing. With death, many of us are always searching for answers to the question why here we have the answer but don’t want it. The irony is what helps to create the strong metaphor Ferry produces in this piece.



 



Language: "Marks" by Linda Pastan

Known for her poems on the topics of motherhood, family, ethics, aging, and death, Linda Pastan is a American poet. One of her great accomplishments was taking on the role of Poet Laureate of Maryland from 1991-1995.

Marks

 

My husband gives me an A

for last night's supper,

an incomplete for my ironing,

a B plus in bed.

My son says I am average,

an average mother, but if

I put my mind to it

I could improve.

My daughter believes

in Pass/Fail and tells me

I pass. Wait til' they learn

I'm dropping out.

 

The poem uses marks (or grades) as a metaphor. The use of grades as a metaphor in this poem makes it clear to us that as a mother she is constantly being judged on her performance. Instead of receiving thanks and praise for all that she does as a mother, she is constantly being assessed on how well she does it.  All of her responsibilities as a mother are listed throughout the poem with a mark from her family to follow. There are three different systems mentioned in the poem that are used to grade her. Her husband grades with letters, her son grades using a charting system, and her daughter uses a pass/fail method. These different systems represent the multiple standards in which she must meet. To create the metaphor the poem uses school jargon. Besides the grading systems, the speaker uses other school related language and ends the poem with “I’m dropping out” (line 12). This phrase brings to light the mother’s irritation with the grading system in which she is constantly judged with. The way the system is forced upon her relates to the way schools force the compliance with a grading system on students. Just as a rebellious student who drops out of school, the concluding phrase suggests that she will no longer be subjected to the judgment of her family. The metaphor uses the familiar idea of grading systems to help the reader to visualize and think of how we feel about what motherhood entails.