Tuesday, May 3, 2011

maggie and milly and molly and may by E. E. Cummings


         10

maggie and milly and molly and may 
went down to the beach(to play one day)

and maggie discovered a shell that sang 
so sweetly she couldn't remember her troubles,and

milly befriended a stranded star
whose rays five languid fingers were;

and molly was chased by a horrible thing 
which raced sideways while blowing bubbles:and

may came home with a smooth round stone 
as small as a world and as large as alone.

For whatever we lose(like a you or a me) 
it's always ourselves we find in the sea

My first reaction to this poem was that it had great imagery. While reading the poem I was able to picture everything that happened to Maggie, Milly, Molly, and May when they were at the beach. One thing that I was confused about was why there was a number 10 at the beginning of the poem. Another thing that interested me was the fact that E.E Cummings decided not to capitalize the names; maggie, milly, molly, and may, especially in the title. This confused me but I also thought it was kind of cool and original of him. I think the meaning of the poem is that all our problems can disappear for a day while we are distracted, but we are distracted with things that might remind us of our troubles. And our troubles can always come back. This poem has 6 stanzas with 2 lines each. There is also an extra stanza at the beginning with the number 10. This is one extra line so in the whole poem there are 13 lines. There is use of imagery, rhyme, alliteration (maggie and milly and molly and may), personification (a shell that sang) and similies (a smooth round stone as small as a world and as large as alone.) 

Edward Estlin Cummings was in Cambridge, Massachusetts on October 14, 1894. He began writing poems when he was around 10 years old, in 1904. He studied Latin and Greek at the Cambridge Latin High School. He received his B.A. in 1915 and his M.A. in 1916, both from Harvard. His studies there introduced him to avant garde writers, such as Gertrude Stein and Ezra PoundIn his work, Cummings experimented radically with form, punctuation, spelling and syntax. He abondened traditional technique and used his own style of writing. His poems were very popular because of the simplicity of his language, his playful mode and his attention to subjects such as war and sex. Cummings received a number of honors, including an Academy of American Poets Fellowship, two Guggenheim Fellowships, the Charles Eliot Norton Professorship at Harvard, the Bollingen Prize in Poetry in 1958, and a Ford Foundation grant. He died on September 3, 1962 and by that time he was the second most widely read poet in the United States, after Robert Frost. He is buried in Forest Hills Cemetery in Boston, Massachusetts.

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