Robertson’s “La Stanza Delle Mosche” conveys something of an entire world within a single space, and in a matter of thirteen lines. Nothing particularly dramatic is the subject. In fact, there is virtually no real event, feeling, or action of any overt meaning as the subject. It is instead a...

Edwin Muir's “Childhood” is a short poem that still manages to capture the range of emotions which often grip children. It combines the dual realities of how a child will dream of going into adventures while still needing the security of home. This is a critical stage in life. The...

To begin, Bishop sets the tone for the entire piece by telling a story about a fish—not just any fish, but a “tremendous” fish. Especially with poetry, in which the substance of the piece is there as soon as it begins (contrasted with prose, where you usually have a little...

Why Study This Poem? Published in 1820, “Lamia” is not often included among Keats’ greatest poems, yet it is worthy of analysis nonetheless. Some have claimed that the poem lacks suspense and characters that are too uninteresting to garner widespread public attention, but I suggest that the message being conveyed...

This brief prose poem by Robert Hass describes a painful interaction between a young man and an older woman, and the message that she leaves for him the following morning. The narrator is a young composer who is spending the summer at an artists’ colony. He becomes infatuated with an...