The poem also has an element of love for the vultures:
“nestled close to his
mate his smooth”
“feathers, inclined affectionately”
These quotes show that the vultures do have a bit of love and affection in them. The overall subject to the poem is that even evil and unpleasant things have an element of love and affection.
“What were they like?” also has a similar subject to “Vultures” but the subject does not link in the same way. “Vultures” portrays a contrast between good and evil directly, how evil things have good sides to them whereas in “What were they like?” evil is shown in the sense that all the goodness of the Vietnamese has been taken away from them.
The poem is a question and answer poem and the poem is about the civil war between the communist North of Vietnam and the capitalist South. The US tried to stop communism spreading by invading Vietnam. The Vietnamese was a peaceful culture until their peace was forced to become evil after being invaded by the US. There is proof in the poem that there was peace and prosperity within the culture of Vietnam:
“1) Sir, their light hearts turned to stone.”
This quote shows that they had light and kind hearts but these hearts were forced into turning into ruthless, uncaring stones whereas the vultures do not need provoking for them to be evil. Also, their hearts turning to stone could be a symbol for death because rocks don’t move.
The poem takes a question and puts emphasis on something unpleasant which is like “Vultures” because emphasis is also put in the poem to make something more unpleasant.
The culture was also, obviously, unrespected by the quote:
“It is not remembered”. This shows that nothing is remembered of the culture itself and the people of the culture. “Perhaps” also shows that nothing is remembered of the culture.
So, “What were they like?” is similar to “Vultures” in the way that the poems both show that evil things have good sides to them. Even though these are shown in different ways, they both have the same meaning.
The language in “Vultures” is not very complicated and the words are not very long. Also he uses negative adjectives to portray the evilness of the vultures. For example: bashed-in, dead, dump, broken.
All these adjectives emphasize the evilness of the vultures. The language in the poem is based around negative words but has a few positive words which are meant to show the tiny element of love. The description of the vultures is in the past tense whereas the commander part is in the present tense. This maybe be telling us that evil is still around and will always be around. The ending of the poem is ambiguous because the poet might be telling us to think that love still exists in bad things or he might mean that evil still exists no matter what.
The language in “What were they like?” does have some long words but overall the language is simple which is like “Vultures”. The language is quite inquisitive unlike “Vultures” which is not very inquisitive. It is also formal:
“Sir, their light hearts turned to stone.”
Some of the sentences are also juxtaposed so nice things are put next to negative things or the opposite. This degrades the joy in a way:
“laughter is bitter to the burned mouth”
Laughter is a positive and nice word but it is put next to bitter which is a negative word. This is like “Vultures” because “Vultures” put many negative words next to the positive ones whoch show love and compassion.
The structure in “Vultures” is free verse. At the end of some of the sentences there is also enjambment which is there because it keeps the flow of the poem going:
“In the greyness
and drizzle of one despondent
dawn unstirred by harbingers
of sunbreak a vulture
perching high on broken
bone of a dead tree”
There is no punctuation in the section either because it also keeps the rhythm of the poem going. In the poem there is also “…”. These mark the end of one section and the beginning of another.
The Structure in “What were they like?” is a question and answer structure whereas “Vultures” is a normal verse poem but free verse instead. At the beginning of each answer or question there is a number to represent the answer to what question but “Vultures” has a different structure to “What were they like?”. There is no space in between lines which is similar to “Vultures” in the way that “Vultures” does not leave spaces in between lines.
After reading “Vultures” I felt a bit positive knowing that evil things have loving sides to them. Again, it is ambiguous on what the poem was meant to end like but I think that the poem started in a negative way and ended in a negative way.
“What were they like?” also starts in a negative way and ends in one which is like “Vultures”.
“Who can say? It is silent now.”
This quote shows that the ending is negative. “It is silent now” means that the culture is now dead so no-one can tell.
