Villanelle

I have loved "Do Not Go Gentle into That Good Night" since reading it in the middle school. I connect with the unwillingness to give into death. It is also heartbreaking that Thomas apparently wrote this as his father died; I can just see Thomas sitting by his father's bedside as his father slips from the world and Thomas begs him to not go gently into that good night. This may be a large misjudgment, but I feel like knowing why he wrote the poem add a new layer of understanding. Without that knowledge and last stanza, the villanelle would stand as a beautiful exaltation of personal strength. Knowing that Thomas's father was dying or had died, makes me view the villanelle as a plea to his father, who I assume Thomas loved, to stay with Thomas in this world. My view of the poem shifts from beautiful to tragically beautiful. 

Beauty aside, I must chose "One Art" as the poem that most adeptly utilizes the villanelle to communicate Bishop's message. It appears to me that Bishop is telling her audience that losing things is an art and that it is not hard to master. Considering that Bishop later talks about losing someone close to her, I feel like the losses mentioned at the beginning of the poem are intended to be training of sorts for the greater losses that are inevitable. While I love Thomas's poem, I began to feel by the third stanza that I was getting lost in all of his rages and nights. But where Thomas left me slightly muddled, I arrived at the end of Bishop's poem feeling refreshed, like bursting out of a cool brook. Ok, the cool brook thing may be a bit much, but I really did feel like "One Art" was far easier to follow. Which, in turn, made me feel like I better understood what Bishop was wanting to tell us. Unlike how it mentioned in the introduction on villanelles about how they are often very cyclical and do not tell a narrative, Bishop managed to build upon each stanza in a manner that is similar to a narrative, or plot. She begins with her idea that losing is an easy art, then gives examples of simple losses- keys, small increments of time. Next she graduates to things of slightly more importance- names, thoughts, then family heirlooms, and houses. Then Bishop takes a dive off the deep end and tells us that she lost two cities, some realms, bodies of water, and a continent. How the hell you gonna lose a continent? Oh, I get it. She probably left the continent and to her, it has been lost. Same with the cities and other assorted land bits. Crap. I forgot to mention this. All these losses.yeah.they aren't disasters. Which is part of the art of losing. It is easy and losing things does not equate a disaster. And now ladies and gentlemen, the final stanza. The grand finale of losses. All of these losses have been preparing her for loosing someone very close to her. She even takes the time to mention specific traits that she misses. There is a change in how she discusses the art of losing. Instead of saying that "the art of losing isn't hard to master" she now says "the art of losing's not TOO hard to master." I capitalized 'too' to make sure you saw the difference. Wasn't that nice of me? But it is very important. She is now saying that the art of losing is hard, but its not "too" hard. But now she is also admitting that it looks like disaster. And that's how the poem ends. So uplifting. I'm being facetious, but at the same time I'm not. She has written this entire poem about not being affected by life's losses and then falters when she get to the last stanza. Why do that? This is simply my interpretation at 12 am, so please take it with a grain of salt, but I don't think she would have had it any other way. To be able to look at all the other losses in life and believe that they are not disasters makes us stronger and more apt to deal with the losses that truly are disasters. 

Good lord that is long. I'm sorry Mrs.Whitman; I know you really read these and put time into them. (I hope that doesn't come across smartass-ish). Anyway, I believe that "One Art" communicates its message better because it builds upon itself and didn't leave me feeling like I had been drug around in a circle. "The Waking" and "Do Not Go Gently into That Good Night" are both beautiful but kinda remind me of songs like Bad Romance or really anything by Bjork- they are gorgoeus but I never know what the *#@! (I'm so tired that I actually wrote the word and nearly had a heart attack.) they are saying.