Blog 5/6

While some poems focus exclusively on a personal or private experience, others reflect on the place of the individual in the larger human community. In the work of at least two poets, explore the ways in which poems have conveyed the poet's sense of the world beyond the private sphere.

The two poems that I chose from Emily Dickinson are "I'm Nobody! Who are you?" and "Tell all the truth but tell it slant". In "I'm Nobody! Who are you?", Emily Dickinson used a lot of rhetorical strategies to describe her situation in the community.
Firstly, she utilized metaphor a lot in the poem. "I'm Nobody! Who are you?" The first line perfectly gives readers an introduction of herself, by using the technique of metaphor. She describes herself as a person that is isolated by others, or she isolated others. In the second stanza, she says that: "How dreary – to be – Somebody!". She described people around her as Somebody. By doing this, it creates a strongly comparison between her and the community around her. The next line says that: "How public – like a Frog –". Right here Emily Dickinson again used metaphor to describe people around her as frogs. This probably shows that all the people around her like to talk gossips, and she really hates people talk or comment about her. Despite the use of metaphor in the poem, Emily Dickinson also capitalized certain words to highlight the meanings of it. For example, she capitalized words like: Somebody, Nobody, Frogs, and Bog. Nobody is the opposite of somebody, and he used the words frogs and bog to describe the whole community around her just like frogs "ribbit" in the bog. She wants to stay alone and live with the nature, but people around her always disturb her.
"Tell all the truth but tell it slant" is saying that common people cannot accept the truth. Instead, people like to hear about lies and gradually figure out the truth. In this poem, she also uses metaphor. She describes the truth as lightning. If people directly know about the truth, they will dazzle and even get blind. This probably describes about how her view of the people around her. Because she is a recluse, she is more likely to see through the appearance to the essence. But people in the community cannot do it and sometimes even think her idea is crazy. Also, use of words also helps her to illustrate her point. The second line says that: "Success in Circuit lies". Of course, this means that success is found in circuit, but the word "lies" has its second meaning, which is dishonest. Probably Emily Dickinson wants to tell that telling a truth to a whole community or people around her needs unremitting effort; he/she also needs to lie to them so that they can truly accept the truth.