Five Ways to Kill a Man

Task:

Choose two of the following poems and discuss what you believe is the main idea of each poem.

In other words, identify the topic the author is discussing and what the author is saying about that topic. What ultimate message is the poet trying to convey?

______

This Is a Photograph of Me

by Margaret Atwood

It was taken some time ago.

At first it seems to be

a smeared

print: blurred lines and grey flecks

blended with the paper;

then, as you scan

it, you see in the left-hand corner

a thing that is like a branch: part of a tree

(balsam or spruce) emerging

and, to the right, halfway up

what ought to be a gentle

slope, a small frame house.

In the background there is a lake,

and beyond that, some low hills.

(The photograph was taken

the day after I drowned.

I am in the lake, in the centre

of the picture, just under the surface.

It is difficult to say where

precisely, or to say

how large or small I am:

the effect of water

on light is a distortion

but if you look long enough,

eventually,

you will be able to see me.)

Five Ways to Kill a Man

by Edwin Brock

There are many cumbersome ways to kill a man.

You can make him carry a plank of wood

to the top of a hill and nail him to it. To do this

properly you require a crowd of people

wearing sandals, a cock that crows, a cloak

to dissect, a sponge, some vinegar and one

man to hammer the nails home.

Or you can take a length of steel,

shaped and chased in a traditional way,

and attempt to pierce the metal cage he wears.

But for this you need white horses,

English trees, men with bows and arrows,

at least two flags, a prince and a

castle to hold your banquet in.

Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind

allows, blow gas at him. But then you need

a mile of mud sliced through with ditches,

not to mention black boots, bomb craters,

more mud, a plague of rats, a dozen songs

and some round hats made of steel.

In an age of aeroplanes, you may fly

miles above your victim and dispose of him by

pressing one small switch. All you then

require is an ocean to separate you, two

systems of government, a nation's scientists,

several factories, a psychopath and

land that no one needs for several years.

These are, as I began, cumbersome ways

to kill a man. Simpler, direct, and much more neat

is to see that he is living somewhere in the middle

of the twentieth century, and leave him there.

This Is Just To Say

by William Carlos Williams

I have eaten

the plums

that were in

the icebox

and which

you were probably

saving

for breakfast

Forgive me

they were delicious

so sweet

and so cold

(Hospital Vespers)

by The Weakerthans (John K. Samson)

Doctors play your dosage like a card trick
Scrabbled down the hallways yelling "Yatzee"
I brought books on Harper in the Arctic
Something called "The Politics of Lonely"
A toothbrush and Quick Pick with the plus
You tried not to roll your sunken eyes
And said "Hey can you help me? I can't reach it"
Pointed to the camera in the ceiling
I climbed up, blocked it so they couldn't see
Turned to find you out of bed and kneeling
Before the nurses came took you away
I stood there on a chair and watched you pray

The Spider

by Kathleen Jamie

To support the launch of the 10:10 campaign to reduce carbon emissions, the Review asked some of our greatest poets to produce new work in response to the crisis; published in The Guardian, Saturday 26 September 2009

When I appear to you

by dark, descended

not from heaven, but the lowest

branch of the walnut tree

bearing no annunciation,

suspended like a slub

in the air's weave -

and you shriek, you shriek

so prettily I'm reminded

of the birds - don't they also

cultivate elaborate beauty, devour

what catches their eye?

Hence my night shift,

my sulphur and black striped

jacket - poison - a lie

to cloak me while, exposed,

I squeeze from my own gut

the one material;

Who tore the night?

Who caused this rupture?

You, staring in horror

- have you never considered

how the world sustains?

- the ants by day

clearing, clearing,

the spiders mending endlessly.