Poetry Analysis

Locate a poem on your own (can be a poem or song lyrics *must

be appropriate for school!) and write a persuasive paragraph
outlining what makes the poem effective, what makes it
appealing to you or what makes it good or bad.
Demons; Imagine Dragons
When the days are cold
And the cards all fold
And the saints we see
Are all made of gold,
When your dreams all fail
And the ones we hail
Are the worst of all
And the bloods run stale,
I wanna hide the truth
I wanna shelter you
But with the beast inside
Theres nowhere we can hide,
No matter what we breed
We still are made of greed
This is my kingdom come
This is my kingdom come,
When you feel my heat
Look into my eyes
Its where my demons hide

Its where my demons hide

Dont get too close
Its dark inside
Its where my demons hide
Its where my demons hide,
At the curtains call
It's the last of all
When the lights fade out
All the sinners crawl,
So they dug your grave
And the masquerade
Will come calling out
At the mess you made,
Don't wanna let you down
But I am hell bound
Though this is all for you
Don't wanna hide the truth,
No matter what we breed
We still are made of greed
This is my kingdom come
This is my kingdom come,
When you feel my heat
Look into my eyes
Its where my demons hide
Its where my demons hide

Dont get too close

Its dark inside
Its where my demons hide
Its where my demons hide,
They say it's what you make
I say it's up to fate
It's woven in my soul
I need to let you go,
Your eyes, they shine so bright
I wanna save that light
I can't escape this now
Unless you show me how,
When you feel my heat
Look into my eyes
Its where my demons hide
Its where my demons hide
Dont get too close
Its dark inside
Its where my demons hide
Its where my demons hide
This poem is very appealing to me and I feel I can relate on many
levels to the message. It is about the demons that live within your soul.
This relates to myself and my theme because my them is self, this
relates to your inner troubles and reflects who you are as a person.
This is also why it is appealing to me. Not only do I like the rythm of
the song/poem but as well as its meaning and what is portays when it
explains a humans needs and inner-personality. It proves that not only

do we have good sides but we all have bad sides that are hidden deep
within us. I can very much relate to this. Not in the sense that I feel I
am a bad person, but I am familiar with others bad sides and can
notice myself finding my own. I feel this song is a good representation
of a teenager trying to find themselves as it explains how they are
unable to hide there demons as they do not know how, allowing the
reader to believe that they are learning to. These reasons are many of
the reasons why I feel connected to this song/poem. Everyone has
there own bad side and bad memories they want hidden.

Choose a poem to analyze and write an expository

paragraph in which you describe what makes this
poem a good poem and in what way it relates to your
portfolio theme.
Dreams
Langston Hughes, 1902 - 1967
A

Hold fast to dreams

For if dreams die

Life is a broken-winged bird

That cannot fly.

Hold fast to dreams

For when dreams go

Life is a barren field

Frozen with snow.

Denotation:
Line 1: Dont give up on your dreams
Line 2: Dreams die once you wake up because the dream is over
Line 3: Life is unfortunate/ broken
Line 4: Life cant fly

Line 5: Dont give up on your dreams

Line 6: Once dreams becoming discouraged and disappear
Line 7: Life is empty, such as a barren field
Line 8: Winter has come, winter involves falling snow and coldness
Connotation:
Line 1: Hold onto your dreams
Line 2: If you give up on your dreams
Line 3: Life has a broken wing- It is unable to function properly if you
give up on your
dreams
Line 4: Life is not able to work properly and will become harsh
Line 5: Hold onto your dreams (repeating it creates the sense that it is
important and a main part of the poem)
Line 6: Expresses how once you give up on life (your dreams) you lose
hope
Line 7: Feeling isolated and are unable to talk to loved ones, has no
one around them, as a whole life is an empty field
Line 8: Life has become cold
This poem is very meaningful and shows the true side of a
"nightmare" whether is be consious or unconsiously. A nightmare in
which you lose all hope for your dreams and you may or may not be
aware of it. This poem, I believe, is a good poem as it is able to
connect with the reader, no matter what age, and is able to express
what they maybe or have felt. This is expressing that life is cold at
times when it states "frozen at times" Line 8. This shows isolation and
that it can be cold and unbarable. Many feel this way when losing hope
are preparing to give up on something they once loved. This can occur
within acutal dreams and can subconsiously affect the way you act
when you are awake. These can be nightmares which some portay as a
way of looking at the world in a different perspective. When someone
feels this way consiously it could mean that they are not social fully
and have become isolated in their own bubble, feelingcold, in fact
lonely. Secondly, I feel this poem relates to my theme as it gravitates

towards the theme of who you are and for your soul not to give up. My
theme is self, it concentrates about how one may feel or act. The poem
revolves around how one may lose hope in themselves or something
they love, it is about feelings, feelings are about yourself. Therefore the
poem relates to my theme in that respect. Lastly, this poem is very
visual. It can help aid the reader to visualize what the topic is even if
there is no setting. You can visualize someon giving up hope and
believing the world is a terrible place when the poem says, "Life is a
broken-winged bird" Line 3. You are able to see the world being a
horrible place in need of support. The rhyming within the poem also
helps the reader visualize the "setting" and understand the poem
futher as it flows better. Therefore this is a very well written and
understood poem that can relate to my theme of self.

Self Analysis
Actrositic
-Alliteration

4.
F-alling for few negative comments, yet you believe there are
many,
Alliteration
This sentence from my Acrostic powm is an alliteration which is the repition of
a letter at the begining of a word. This line (4) expresses F-alling for few, the words
begin with the letter F and are in an order which they are directly after each other
without any words in between. I feel this helps the poem as it is an easy tool used
commonly in the poetic language. I feel it is a highlight in this poem.

Free Verse
-Metaphor

4.
They are within me, from the pit of my stomach to the electricity
in my brain
Line 4 has a metaphor that reads, "electricity in my brain". This is a metaphor
as I am comparing electricity, the type that could kill if too strong. It runs through
wires and can attack at its worse in water. I have compared this to my brain. An
organ that can hold electric charges but does not have man-made electricity running
through it. Therefore this would be considered a comparison, a metaphor.

21.

My paranoia is a reality,

My Free Verse poem has Line 21 which holds metaphor as well. It expresses
how paranoia is like a reality. It is like a real world experience but it is not. It is in fact
a false feeling that allows the body to feel nervous and unsure of its surroundings.
This is connecting that paranoia can feel very real and almost as if it is in the real
world which is reality. Reality is the real surroundings and its the pure facts about the
world. This is comparing your real life experiences to the paranoied world in your
head and throughout your body. How it feels real but in reality it is not.

-Personification

2.

Visions and memories race past my eyes

I used personification for Line 2 in my Free Verse because I felt this line would
add depth and mystery to my poem. Knowing that visions and memories race past
their eyes, it means that they are remembering events, but I want to reader to ask
themselves, "what is she remembering?". They find out later in the poem that it is
being normal, and not having this evil side that represents a ghost. It would add
depth because I could have used "She remembered this" instead of using
personification by giving visions and memories a human characteristic as they are
unable to "race/run". It allows the reader to to feel as though it is a more serious
matter than her remembering something but almost as if she is surrounded by these
bad "nightmares/memories".

3.

My heart is pumping as its running a marathon

I used personification for Line 3 in my Free Verse poem because I wanted the
reaer to imagine how tiring it would be to feel this terrified. I was them to notice that
she was scared to the point of o return and that her heart was beating so fast and
wouldn't stop. A human characteristic of running a marathon is an activity that a
heart is unable to do on it own, a full human body is able to run a marathon, but a
heart alone is unable to. This means that Line 3 has personification.

-Assonance

9.

Those who choose when I see them,

Assonance is the repetition of a sound or letter. In this case I chose the "o" /
"oo" sound, depending on how you read the line, it may com across as a line with
assonance. I intended it to blend and have a slight rythm to it as I want to hold the
reader in the poem. I was wanting the reader to thourghly read the poem and

recognize that this sentence is very important as it is resembling the ghosts, telling
the reader that they are virtually transparent yet they allow her to see them when
they want her too.

Haiku
-Similie

2.

Inner-love is like a flower,

This line from my Haiku title, Inner-Love, is a simple similie. It is like a

metaphor but instead it uses the words like or as. It is a comparison of 2 things. This
line is a similie as it compares Inner-Love (love for yourself) to a flower. It says it is
just like one when in reality it is very different. In the next line I further explain how it
is like a flower. This is a simple statement of opinion.