Frying Trout While Drunk Summary

This poem captures the profound effect of a mother’s romantic relationship on her daughter adulthood. The poem opens with an image of her mother falling in love with a charismatic man. The speaker then describes her mother alcoholism, being “wrist deep in red water”(9). Her beautiful mother is subjected to the man’s “lechery so solid you could build a table on it”(13,14). The man casted the family in darkness, using the mom to satisfy his own desires. She admits that when she drinks she is “too much like her”(20) mother. The poem ends with on a solemn note, her mother’s love for the man just like her drinking, “dedicated to the act itself”(26).

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Still Image Analysis

Image
This scene embodies the struggles of Jim, Judy, and Plato. All three characters are presented in a dark, dilapidated mansion. The condition of the house and the darkness of the setting represent how each of them is lost in their dysfunctional lives. Continuing with this notion, we see Plato holding a candelabra that has three burning candles. Each flame represents a character trying to find their way through life. Their lives are rife with teenage drama and family conflict. The length of the candles symbolizes their lives. The burning candles represent the gradual but inevitable transition to adulthood. At the same time, the candles also symbolize the fragility of life. Towards the end of the film Plato is shot and killed, his candle blown out. Their struggles with the transition are evident in the roles each of them takes on: Jim and Judy a newlywed couple and Plato a real estate agent. They take on these personas as a way to cope with the expectations of adulthood.  They also ...
Read more

The Wild Swans at Coole

Image
“The Wild Swan at Coole” describes an older man’s annual observation of swans. The opening stanza sets a picturesque scene of autumn and upon the peaceful water “are nine-and-fifty swans,”(6). The specificity of the number swans alludes to the author's adoration for them. The swans symbolize something important to him as this has been his “nineteenth autumn,”(7) that he has observed them take flight “upon their clamorous wings,”(12). Nostalgically, the author reminisces the first time he heard the swans take flight who “trod with a lighter tread,”(18) but is saddened that “all’s changed since,”(15). He personifies the swans as lovers whose “hearts have not grown old,”(22) even if they “wander where they will,” (23) as if he envies them.  In the last stanza, the author stills the swans, going from describing them as happy and free-flying to drifting “on the still water,”(25). Even though the swans may settle in “what rushes they build,”(27), his rapture is fleeting only to “find the...
Read more