A Rant about The Ancient Magus’ Bride

The picture here may look like this anime is about a cute romantic retelling of the Beauty and the Beast and it's just that but it is worse. Dropped this one just after watching one and a half episode, because I couldn't take how the "romance" was getting handled in this.

So, we have Chise, the 15 year old protagonist of the show, who is SOLD AT AN AUCTION to a magician by the name of Elias, who is, later we'll know, more than 200 years old, because she is going to be his apprentice in magic. So right after the girl is brought to his place, guess what, he immediately does?

STRIPS HER NAKED FOR A BATH WHEN SHE WAS CLEARLY PROTESTING.

His reason was that "she cannot do it". I don't understand which part of bathing she couldn't do? Take her clothes herself? Fill the tub with warm water? Or just take a bath? Why does he have to strip her naked? And are we supposed to find this romantic? I really did not understand that scene. And all these happened within the first 10 minutes of episode one.

Fleeting Thoughts

I forgot when I actually wrote this poem. I found this piece while rummaging through one my many diaries. I think I should post it just for the sake of documentation. Unfortunately, I did not name the original poem. So, maybe I will cook a name up after I am done typing the poem. Additionally, I didn’t even jot the date down. Silly me!

It’s been days, I have written.

Pillows flared, bed clothes beaten.

Cobwebs formed on distant ceiling.

How am I to tell my feeling?

I take this pen and diary to write.

Mind numb; thoughts unbright.

Wrong words fill up the pages.

I feel like small birds in cages.

When will this isolation cease?

Open the window; let in the breeze.

The wind shall take my breath away.

The clouds shan’t make my room more grey.

The sun shall shine and inspire me.

All my annoying thoughts shall flee.

I shall fill pages anew.

Let’s start with the morning dew.

The Enigma in The Listeners

The Listeners by Walter de la Mare is the exploration of the dichotomous relationship between silence and response. The poem begins with the arrival of a Traveller, a mysterious figure, at an isolated house in the middle of the forest on a moonlit night. Despite his urgent knocks on the front door of the house, he fails to receive any response from the inhabitants of the house. In fact, it is implied that the house is supposedly empty, except for a “host of phantom listeners” who are lurking in the darkness and listening to the cry of the Traveller. In essence, the poem is a depiction of the paradoxical nature of humans having a thirst for knowledge despite being aware of the astounding and inevitable mystery which lies in the path of gaining that knowledge.

The setting of the poem includes a house, residing alone in the middle of a forest and a lonesome Traveller visits it on a moonlit night. As if being one with the nature, even the horse of the Traveller is silent, as it chomped on the desolate “ferny floor” of the forest. All of these together paints a melancholic and meditative picture within the poem. In addition to that, the intentional unresponsive nature of the ghostly inhabitants of the house, which the Traveller is unaware of, adds a supernatural element to the setting poem.

The Inherent Contradiction in Pied Beauty

Pied Beauty by Gerard Manley Hopkins is a deconstructed sonnet that applauds the diversity of nature created by God. The structure and verses of the poem are reminiscent of a prayer, similar to Bible verses. The little sonnet is the celebration of diverse creation of God. The poem is divided into two stanzas. The first stanza comprises of an assorted set of examples the poet finds beautiful. Meanwhile, the second stanza is more of a generalized statement about the sundry of nature. The poem begins with the call to praise the Lord and it ends on a similar note as well.

All in all, the poet reasons that the God is worthy of any worship simply because of the varied nature of his creation. According to him, only a being as omnipotent as God can paint the sky in dual colors as such of a brinded cow; can put rose-hued speckles on trout; can plot and piece a land beautifully etc. Only a powerful being like God can create something original and beautiful but so strange. However, there is a huge contradiction with the poet’s reasoning. Even though he praises God for creating a multitude of objects and creatures, God himself remains eternal and absolute with no scope of diversity. God himself is an infinite constant – an unchangeable being. Hence the question remains that how something as static as God can create myriads of different things. The poem finds beauty in difference. But as God is unvarying and perpetual in qualities, it almost appears as though God himself may not be the most beautiful being. Hence, the message of the poem is inherently in contradiction to itself.  

        

What is Poetry through the Lenses of Dickinson, Chakravarty and Reed

The following essay is a brief discussion of finding out what poetry is. The three poems mentioned in the essay are: That's What Poetry Is by Nirendranath Chakravarty, I Dwell in Possibility by Emily Dickinson and finally, Beware: Do Not Read This Poem by Ishmael Reed. It maintains the structure of a conventional essay with a word count of 464 words. 

Nearly every poet in their life has tried to define the features that constitute a poem. That’s What Poetry Is, I Dwell in Possibility, Beware: Do not read this poem by poets Nirendranath Chakravarty, Emily Dickinson and Ishmael Reed respectively are three such poems which explore the idea of what poetry is through the lens of the aforementioned three poets. Despite having some dissimilarities, the poems do share a common ground in terms of thematic messages, use of metaphors and concrete imagery and symbolism.

The Ruined Maid by Thomas Hardy: Prose and Analysis

A young girl from the countryside happens to meet her former friend one day while visiting the Town. Her friend goes by the name Amelia and the country girl is perplexed to see how Amelia is dressed in such a fancy gown and moves with a regal poise. So, she stops her old friend and expresses her surprise in meeting her so suddenly. She also asks her how Amelia managed to get herself such fair garments and prosperity. In response, Amelia asks the country maiden whether she knows if she is ruined, implying that losing her innocence by either being an escort to a wealthy lord or a high class sex worker brought her all these lavishness.

The country maiden further goes on to ask Amelia how she has been able to change her life while simultaneously providing little details of her former life in the countryside. She mentions how Amelia did not even own shoes or sock and how her clothes were in tatters. Moreover, she details how she used to speak in dialect, especially the dialect of old Irish countryside. Furthermore, she briefs about how her hands used to resemble a paw due to all the hard work she had to do in the potato fields and her face was always bleak and blue due to the cold and dirt. But now, Amelia has rosy cheeks, speaks in a language befitting an aristocratic company, and wears gloves that fit her delicate hands and also bracelets and feathers. To all of these details about her transformation, Amelia replies by saying that she has achieved this by being ruined.

Metaphors in the Poems of Sylvia Plath and Emily Dickinson

Metaphors are not only integral part of poetry but a significant addition as well, since the presence of metaphors enriches the standard of the literary work. The strength of a metaphor in enhancing the beauty of a poem as well as amplifying its core message can be observed in the poems – “Metaphors” by Sylvia Plath and “My Life had stood – a Loaded Gun” by Emily Dickinson. Both poems successfully used this important literary device in order to paint a coherent picture.

“Metaphors” is a clever little poem by Plath which contains nine lines, each with nine syllables. In fact, in the very first verse of the poem, the narrator mentions that this poem is a riddle of nine syllables. Such arrangement is intentionally made by Plath to mimic the nine-month duration of pregnancy, which the poem is all about. Calling the poem a riddle was an interesting move Plath did as metaphors are normally left up to the reader’s interpretation just like a riddle is. The poet wanted the readers to decipher the imagery created in the poem much like they would decipher a riddle. All in all, “Metaphors” is a poem with a collection of metaphors symbolizing the gestation period a woman goes through.