In “How to read a poem” it says that you need to complete what the poet has started and one way to help was to read aloud. The poem I chose was “The mother” by Gwendolyn Brooks and at first I read it silently. What I got was a poem about a mother who had to abort a baby and is haunted with regret for her actions but in the end loved her children. On my second read I read it out loud and I got a different experience as I noticed how some words at the end of the lines had rhymed and how the commas had helped set a slightly different tone. I still felt a tone of regret but throughout the poem I felt the mothers love for her children all throughout. In the lines,” If I stole your births and names, Your straight baby tears and your games, Your stilted or lovely loves, your tumults, your marriages, aches, and your deaths,” When read silently I had the tone of a mother who knew that she stole the future of her children and was regretful with what she did. After reading it out loud I had seen a mother who knew what she did and was instead sad and apologetic to them that they never had the chance to live their own life.
3 thoughts on “Alvin Tan Discussion 12”
Hi Alvin
after reading “The mother” by Gwendolyn Brooks I definitely felt a tone of regret and that she wanted to be a mother and she still thinks about all of her aborted children, as the poem goes on she’s talking about who they could have been as adults and what they could have been doing as that present moment. And I definitely agree with her knowing what she did and instead felt sad and regret.
Hi Alvin,
I agree with your view on “The Mother” she expressed a few different emotions with the loss of children she did not keep. She expressed her guilt and regret, she even expressed a sense of love for the unborn children.
Hi Alvin,
In “The Mother” I do think that the mother is experiencing regret and grief about the past abortions she had and the lives they could’ve had. She speaks of her children in the past tense and mourns the things they will not be able to do because they were never conceived. Though a tricky topic to balance the mortality of her children or her well-being. It is very direct and lets the reader know exactly how she feels. The love and regret were conveyed clearly in the poem.