Poetry Explication

This is my poetry explication from “Alone” by Maya Angelou.

Still I Rise

Today in class, we read another poem by Maya Angelou, which was called, “Still I Rise”. It was about a woman who dealt with a lot of problems but she still rise. This poem taught me that happiness is a decision, I believe that this is true because there are people who take problems a different way. Some people either hide their emotions and keep a smile on their face or they just be mad at the world. It’s very important to love yourself and others because it will give you the happiness that you want. When I was younger people would always talk about how I was ugly and big for my age and at some point I believed the words that were coming out of their mouths, I never had confidence in myself and would always talk myself down because that’s what other people did to me. But as I got older I realized that people are going to have their opinions about you and that’s what made me stronger and made me more confident in myself. This poem has made me a better person for myself and it has made me love myself even more.

Life Doesn’t Frighten Me

Today in class, we read another Maya Angelou poem, which was called, “Life Doesn’t Frighten Me”. But before we read the poem the class answered some questions about their fear. While reading and analyzing the poem, it taught me a lot of things. One of the important things that the poem taught me was to never fear anything and that we should get rid of our fear because in the Bible, God says that we shouldn’t fear anything but our parents but what God meant about fear was respect our parents. Another important thing I learned from this poem was that to always have strength with what you are scared of and that IT’S NOT THERE. People she get rid of there fear because it can better themselves and their future as well.

Maya Angelou

Today in class, we read two poems from Maya Angelou, which were, “The Mothering Blackness” and “The Black Family Pledge”. So far Maya Angelou Poems have been my favorite and not only because she is an black writer, her poems teach me that black people should stick together and stop going against each other. With “The Black Family Pledge” she talk about different things that are happening in today’s society for as younger people not respecting their elderly and not appreciating what their ancestors have fought for us people today. They have fought for a lot of things and died for a lot of things so that we can have the freedom that they couldn’t have.

How Being Black Is Important To Me

Being black to me is important because we have different varieties that others don’t have for example, natural hair. Natural hair symbolizes black power, it showed other race that we are very comfortable with our skin and also with our natural hair. With having natural hair, it takes time for black women to do there hair because of all the things they have to do to get it how they want it to look and also they have to put in a lot of products as well. I don’t have natural hair but my sister does and I know how it is for other black women because she have to use a lot of products to do the look that she wants to do. There are other cultures who don’t have natural hair who judge us black people for us having it because they think it’s too big or that it’s too nappy but I believe that our natural hair is what makes us who we are. Another thing that is important to me is slavery. I know that I never experience slavery but i do know that black women and men been through a lot during slavery. No other race can feel how we feel because black people had to lose there family to work for someone who either raped or torture them because they thought it was okay but it really wasn’t. Some different race always tell us black kids that we should stop telling them that they shouldn’t say anything about slavery because we didn’t experience it, but we are as hurt as the people who experienced it because we had great great grandmas and grandpas who experienced it, which is why we always get emotional about what other people say about slavery. As for racism, other race treat us as if we’re trash which is not okay because we are as human as they are. They always come for black peoples because they think that we always doing something negative and that we’re wild animals, they’re always saying slick races slurs, we are just humans who are having the time of there lives. I love being black and I will never change that for nothing in the world.

Cruising with the Beach Boys

Today in class, we read a poem called “Cruising with The Beach Boys” by Dana Gioia. What I learned from this poem was that bringing an past or present memory or memorizes can change your future. I believe this because there are good memorizes and bad memorizes, there are certain things that brings up that memory can change an aspect for your future. It can have an emotional feeling towards the person because the memory can be about an past relationship, sad situation, and even a past loved one.

Cluster

Today in class, we had a sub again so we were assigned to finish our cluster from last week with our group, than we had to write 2 paragraphs about the prompt that was assigned to our group. It was a kind of a hard to start on the essay because we couldn’t really come up with how we were going to start our paragraph. My group eventually figured out what we were going to do. It took us a long time to do the paragraphs, but we managed to still do it.

Critical Reading Questions

Today in class, we had a sub so for today we went into the green book and did critical reading questions. The questions were kind of easy but there were some questions that I didn’t understand. I had t go back to the prologue to figure out what the question was asking.

Multiple Choice Quiz

Today in class, we took an multiple choice quiz, after that we got into groups and did corrections on the quiz. The quiz was hard to m because there were certain words I didn’t know the definition to. I need to work on knowing definitions to words and doing process of elimination when doing a multiple choice test or quiz because it can help me on the AP Exam. When we were in groups, it helped me because my group knew the definition of the words that I didn’t know. This also helped me figured out why my answers were wrong. I need to work on my timing as well because it takes me a long time to understand what the question is asking me, I also should work on reading faster so that I can have more time to answer the questions. I need to make myself put in more effort when I’m taking a quiz or a test because my mind blanks out sometimes and I tend to forget everything that my teacher has taught us in class.

The Pardoner’s Tale Questions

Today in class, we got into groups and answered some questions about “The Pardoner’s Tale”. Each group were assigned to do certain questions, after that we went over the answers from each group. What I learned in class was that I need to reword things when I’m answering a question in class and also when we’re taking a quiz or test. With going over questions every day in class, it helps me with how I should reword my answers when answering a question. I can do that by stating the question or just using words that is similar to the question. This can help me on the AP Exam and also in life because it’s very hard for me to explain myself when I’m answering a question in class or even on a test. I tend to always stutter or even just not answering the question at all. With answering multiple questions and also answering questions on test and quiz, it helps me out with how I should answer and reword my answers.

The Pardoner’s Tale Group Questions

Today in class, we went through the questions that each group made for “The Pardoner’s Tale”. Each group had to answer the question and explain why we chosen the answer. We than used the “best answer” strategy to answer each group question. What I learned today was that money isn’t always about greed, it’s the success that counts. God says that he wants us to have more and overflow. Without having more, you wouldn’t be able to help the people that you want to help. For example, you want to help the homeless, but you can’t because you don’t have the money to help them how you want to help them. Instead of just having the love of money and being greedy, you can help others that really need the help.

The Pardoner’s Tale Quiz

Today in class, we’ve took a quiz about the tale we read yesterday which was “The Pardoner’a Tale”. After taking the quiz, we went through the answers and talked about our mistakes on the quiz. Then, we were assigned to make up a question that weren’t on the quiz. For example, my group had to come up with a question about what an object symbolizes in the tale. I didn’t make the grade that I wanted to make and now that we went through the quiz, I understood what my mistake was which were not doing process of elimination and also not comparison the questions that were on the quiz. I like practicing more with multiple choice because it would give me an better idea of what I should do on the AP exam. What I learned today was a new word which was hedonism which means the pursuit to pleasure. I need to work on knowing definitions to certain words and also I need to work more on process of elimination.

The Pardoners Tale

Today in class, we read “The Pardoner’s Tales”, which was about how a man would go from city’s to city and tell the same story to people that were in church. He told them what they wanted to hear for their money, he didn’t care if they didn’t have enough money to divide for their kids, he would still take their money. What I learned today was was that “Love of money is the root of all evil” and I believe this because their are a lot of people that would do anything to have money. For example, the three rioters were looking for death but instead they had found some money, which made them forget about what they were really looking for. I also learned that there are three and more things that can cause death which are speaking on death, getting involved in dangerous/evil activities, and being careless of your surroundings. Just like the three rioters, getting involved in dangerous activities cause them to die. They all had ideas on what they were going to do to each other and it back fired by all them the rioters dying.

The Wife of Bath Tales

Today in class, we continued to read the rest of “The Wife of Bath Tale”. The knight has found the answer to the queens question from an old lady, but the knight had to give her something in return which was his future. The old lady wanted him to marry her, he didn’t like it at all but he did promise his future so he didn’t have a choice. After reading “The Wife of Bath Tales” we took a quiz on the tale. What I learned from today’s lesson was that men want faithful and loyal women. Some men don’t care about appearance they just want their women to be pay to them and others worry about appearance and not loyalty. For example, the knight didn’t like how the old lady looked, the old lady didn’t or his behavior so she gave him a choice to either have an old faithful lady or an young faithful lady, but he said that it was her choice even though that he wanted the young women. I also learned that it is very important to know the definition of words because it can help you on the AP Exam.

The Wife of Bath Tales

Today in class, we talked more about “The Canterbury Tales” and read the general prologue which talked about the characters and who they were. After learning about the characters, we read "The Wife of Bath Tales".The most important thing that I learned from today’s lesson was that Canterbury is a holy place and people often go there to find or heal themselves. With "The Canterbury Tales" the characters are named by their occupation. I believe that this is important because their are a lot of authors who characters are not named by their occupation but just name by what the author gives them. In "The Wife of Bath Tales", a knight has raped the maiden and the queen wanted to punish him by asking him,"What is the thing that women most desire?". This is very important to me because their are different aspects of what women desire such as wealth, attention, passionate, and so much more in a man, but most women only want to have control of their marriage.

Effort is Everything

Today in class, we watched a video about how effort is everything, being talented and smart is not the key to success. Having effort in what you want to do will succeed you in the future. After that, we talked about “The Canterbury Tales” and the background of Geoffrey Chaucer.

How to finish High School

Today in class, we answered some questions about last semester of what we done and what we remember from the last semester. After that, we watched a video called “How to finish High School”, which was mainly about how seniors want things to go faster that that they can graduate. Seniors should have fun and not pressure themselves into school and to always take a break from working to hard.