Nostalgia In Poetry

In the profound poems “Lament” by Gillian Clarke, “Report to Wordsworth” by Boey Kim Cheng, and “Before the World Intruded” by Michele Rosenthal, the theme of nostalgia is explored through unique stories. Initially, the poem, “Lament” describes the horrible scenes that occurred during the Gulf War, the poem “Report to Wordsworth” is written as a report to Wordsworth, who greatly appreciated nature during the industrial revolution where he defended it, which as a result urges humans to feel empathy for nature due to all the horrible things humans do to it, while on the other hand the poem “Before the World Intruded” introduces the life of a grown-up who misses their infant years and wants to return back to what they define as the golden age of life. Hence, the authors of the poems “Lament”, “Report to Wordsworth”, and “Before the World Intruded” explore the theme nostalgia through the use of diction, structure, and figurative language.

Initially, through the use of diction in each poem, the reader can identify words that relate to loss, regret, and sadness. Primarily, in the poem, “Lament”, the words “loss”, “death”, “sickness”, “funeral” “dying”, “burden”, and “burnt” are all a connotation of loss, death, and regret. Through this diction, the author sends a message to the reader describing the horrible incidents that have

Moreover, the poem “Reports to Wordsworth” makes use of an abundant amount of figurative language in order to alert people about the damage humans have caused to nature, and thus they must attack quickly before it is too late. Primarily, nature is personified as a person, where the author capitalizes the n indicating it has a name. This greatly influences the poem as it demonstrates that nature is also a creature that should be created equally just like anyone else. To add, the use of numerous allusions to greater beings gives a powerful sense to what is happening to nature. For