English Coursework
Love poetry, like love itself, can be light-hearted, heavy-hearted or passionate. In this essay I will talk about these three categories of poems and the differences between them.
A brilliant example of a light-hearted love poem is the Post 20th Century poem ‘I wanna be yours’, by John Cooper Clarke. We can tell straight away that it is light-hearted because of the way the title is written. This poem has no punctuation. This speeds up the poem and goes straight to the point that he wants to be hers. It sounds almost like a song and is very easy and simple to read and understand. We can see that it is a very modern poem because the author puts lots of everyday objects into it such as “vacuum cleaner”, “coffee pot”, and “teddy bear”. He also does this to show her how he wants to be a part of her everyday life. He repeats the word “your” to show his deep love for her and he keeps telling her that he wants to hers and tries to emphasise it as much as possible. He says, “let me be your Ford Cortina”, to describe himself. He does this because a Ford Cortina is a very reliable cars and he’s is showing her that she can trust him and rely on him and he will look after and support her. He is genuine and will treat her right. Near the end in line 26 and 27, he says, “that’s how deep is my emotion, deep deep deep deep de deep deep.” This again, shows a likeness to a song and is telling her that his love is so deep and on going for her. This poem gives heaps of detail about his endless love for her and definitely shows the light-hearted side to love.
The poem ‘One Flesh’, written by Elizabeth Jennings, shows the heavy-hearted side to love. In the first line there are two words, which describe the atmosphere between the two people, and sets the scene. These two words are “apart” and “separate”. We can tell they have split up or are on the way to getting a divorce. In the next paragraph it says about age and time, so is it that they are too old to split up and are just staying with each other because they have no one else. They have to carry on living together because they might not be living at all for much longer. Their love has died out and they tired of each other. She brings up death again when she says, “her eyes fixed on the shadows overhead.” They both know that death is coming for them and there is no point with their relationship anymore. It says in lines 7 to 12 how they lie together and hardly ever touch. They have little feeling and “chastity faces them.” There is no sound or movement or effort from either of them. In the last paragraph it explains how they still have each other, they need each other, but there is still no love. In the last line the word “fire” is used. This tells us that there once was a passion for each other and that they used to share their love, but the very last word used is “cold”. This describes everything and tells us the fire has burnt out and died away. It tells us that it is dead, so is it that the man and woman are both dead as well? They could be in coffins, deep underground, never to speak or touch again. This poem is a very depressing poem and really highlights the heavy-hearted side to love, by using harsh words and constantly talking about death.
