#aplit16hmtproject

Poem #2: I am Serena Joy

Travis: Travis had a total of four common remarks and one insight. What I appreciated most from Travis’s annotations was how he noticed the volta in my poem. The last two lines go from “the lamenting” (or whining as Travis noticed) to question and finally to self realization of how Serena is “the significant one to blame now”. 

Saim: Saim had a total of three common remarks, two insights, and two questions. Saim hit the nail on the head with my search for hierarchy within women when he stated “Women control women. But all are limited.” I almost didn’t need to write more poems after that but that’s why I thought it was important to explore what other people interpreted from my poems. Atwood is making a huge feminist criticism in her novel by exploring how women are all working to work against each other rather than trying to take down the main power source: the men. 

Ben: Ben had a total of four common remarks and three insights. Ben unlike the other guys noticed a subtle part of my poem that I wanted noticed which was my use of the word “performing” instead of intercourse to describe the Ceremony. I think there is a lot still to be said about the Ceremony and what it really means and Ben was right to notice and explore the subject especially after reading “Ceremony” by Silko. 

Poem #1: I am blue

The first picture above represents the “Master-Annotation” which is my own. During my process, I put my poem and a guy’s poem side by side and compared the two annotations. I began with Travis.

Travis: Travis had a total of four common remarks, one new insight, and one question. With Travis but with every other guy, they all noticed the first word in my poem, “Tristesse” and gave a definition for the word (I was happy they all did this). Travis’s question about my fourth line, “For the world I wanted to subdue” was “Inner world or outer world?” which I thought was very interesting because I’d never considered it. Serena Joy (who is blue) probably faced an external but also internal conflict within her. I can’t imagine she wasn’t ever tempted in her life to sin. 

Saim: Saim had a total of five common remarks, three insights, and one question. He knocked this poem out of the park. Saim separated my poem into two parts, the past and present which I did not even intend but subconsciously I probably did this. Also, because Serena Joy’s character is so conflicted and I was trying to portray that, without realizing I played with both aspects of dark and light in the poem (as noticed by Saim). 

Ben: Ben had a total of four common remarks, one insight, and one question. Ben did a good job at interpreting my lines more literally to find meaning. For the eleventh line, he interpreted it as “Hasn’t been noticed in a while” which makes sense because Serena Joy was literally glowing and in the lime light when she sang. 

Blue... Green... and Red... colors that I brought to life through poetry

My Handmaid’s Tale Project:

1. Choosing what to do...

For my final project, I decided to focus on an aspect of the book that was still bothering me, the hierarchy of women in Gilead. To explore their roles and relationships, I decided to take one of their most symbolic motif’s, the color they wear, and have it speak through a powerful poem. Then, to compliment that color, I wrote a second poem that focused on the specific character. In total, I ended up with six poems. 

2. Writing the poetry...

To my surprise, it took me A LONG time to write these because I had such writer’s block. I wanted these poems to perfectly express my views on the character’s and the power they hold. A lot of times I became stuck (especially due to the complex rhyming scheme) but I am absolutely in love with my poems and there are a few lines that I would consider to be my best work. 

3. Annotating my poetry...

I decided that to best finish my six master pieces I would annotate them as if anything else I would annotate. I worked hard on making connections and was surprised to see that I noticed some things in my poetry that I had unintentionally written in :) 

4. Getting feedback...

Due to the fact that everybody annotates a little differently and several drafts of annotations will lead to discoveries in writing, I asked several people to annotate my works. Fortunately, I have such a nice class and three guys in my 5th hour class agreed and one guy from 2nd hour agreed. Their annotations: 

BRILLIANT. Thank you Travis, Saim, Ben, and Tristan for helping me understand my subject more and for investing time and effort into my project. 

5. Scoring and analyzing...