The tone in ‘Nothing’s Changed’ is very angry and violent, to show the poets attitude to the fact that nothing has changed. His ideas and violent feelings are revealed in his tone. He shows a very bad attitude towards white people. The tone can be seen as that of a resigned way, as if he knows that it almost too much to hope that things can change.
The poem ‘Two Scavengers …’ can be seen as a loud angry tone, to protest about the failure of democracy. It can also be seen as a somber, muted tone, to express sadness that a gap remains between rich and poor. Comparison in detail has been done between the two garbage men and the cool couples.
The poem ‘Nothing’s Changed’ is written in the present tense. Even though he is talking about a past experience, it’s like it is happening now. This is one of the features that were used in the language to make us read the poem. The poet uses alliteration in all the stanzas except stanza four. In the first stanza he used alliteration when he used the words cuffs, cans and crunch. In the third stanza the poet uses alliteration on ‘g’. He also uses rhythmic echo in ‘hands’, ‘bones’ and ‘lungs’ in the second stanza. Repetition and assonance is also used in the second stanza. Sound pattern has been used in the fifth stanza. All this shows how the poet reveals his ideas and feelings about his culture and tradition. So the language he used helped him a lot to reveal his thoughts and feelings.
The poem title ‘Two Scavengers …’ shows us that the poem will be about the contrasts between two pairs of people, the scavengers who are the poor and beautiful people who are the rich. The language is modern, simple and sometimes colloquial. The poet uses short cuts like ‘&’ is used instead of ’and’. The poem is written in the present tense, which makes us feel that all the events are happening now. That also suggests that the huge gap between rich and poor is a problem now, too. The poet uses metaphor and repetition of ‘and’. He uses a lot of harsh sounds in this poem. He used no punctuation in this poem, if he wanted the reader to pause, he started a new line.
The poem ‘Nothing’s Changed’ is written in six stanzas. This type of layout creates a sense of control. It tells us that the poet is very clear about what he is feeling. The fourth stanza has a very unusual length. It just has two short lines. The structure reveals the poet’s feelings and ideas towards his culture.
The structure used in ‘Two Scavengers …’ is quite simple. It is written in four stanzas of varying length. The layout is fairly free, that tells us how the poet feels towards the culture that he is talking about. The layout of the poem is very unusual and is easily noticeable. Similar to ‘Nothing’s Changed’ the structure of this poem also tells us a lot about the culture & traditions of the poet.
The two poets reveal their ideas and feelings about the cultures and traditions that they are speaking about in many ways using the tone, language and the structure of the poem. Both the poets show us that they are angry about the events that are taking place in the poem. Both the poems are political in viewpoint. I personally found ‘Two Scavengers…’ more interesting than ‘Nothing’s Changed’ because of its layout and unusual storyline.