Ogun is set out in small blocks of two line long stanzas which gives the impression of the uncle hobbling along on his “flat footed…clip clop sandals”. The variation of line length gives the reader the image of the sounds and rhythms of his workplace. The lines are broken up in a strange way that means that sometimes words get split up onto different lines and even verses, this gives the impression of uncertainty which is linked to the uncertainty of the uncle about where his future lies and where his next meal is coming from.
Charlotte O’Neil’s song is very different in layout. The poem is in the form of a song, which may make the audience think that it might be something that Charlotte O’Neil might sing as a form of defiance and to keep spirits high like slave songs sung during the slave trade. The rhyme pattern of the first stanza is that of a limerick, which is a kind of poem quite popular with children as it is quite easy to make an effective limerick. This gives the impression that Charlotte O’Neil is quite young and that she may not be very well educated. This could also show that she may have missed her childhood as she started very young as a slave girl.
In the poem Ogun, Edward Kamau Brathwaite uses a lot of sensual imagery to bring the scene of the workshop to life: The reader ‘hears’ the ‘quick sandpaper’ and the ‘blasts of heavy hammer’, and sees the ‘intersecting x of folding chairs’, feels the ‘smoothing’, of the ‘white wood.’ Other language that Brathwaite uses makes the reader aware that the uncle’s work is hard, painful at times. He has almost become like the pieces of furniture he has made. The poet uses internal half-rhymes and alliteration to make the lines feel, thick, physical, like the work. For example: The knuckles of his hands were sil-/ vered knobs of nails hit, hurt and flat-/ tened out with blast of heavy hammer.’ The poet shows that he is very proud of his uncle and that the audience should be. We know this is because he writes: “There was no shock of wood, no beam / of light mahogany his saw teeth couldn’t handle.” Which tells unquestionably that the uncle is skilled. Brathwaite also makes the uncle sound almost like a God as he is bringing a kind of life into the world in the form of his sculpture and also the way he empathises with nature, “Cold / world of wood caught fire as he whittled”.
In Charlotte O’Neil’s Song the language of the poem is simple, everyday, ordinary. There are no obvious poetic devices, such as metaphor or personification. The poet has chosen this type of straightforward, uncomplicated language to suit the character of a servant girl. The decisive, long-suffering tone of the poem creates its power.
The poem Ogun tells the reader several things about other people’s cultures. For example it tells the reader about the problems facing people living in third world countries, ie the poverty and unemployment that they are facing due to mechanisation and automation developments in more economically developed countries making cheaper furniture, although not to quite as high a quality as the hand made furniture. It also shows that medical problems are harder to cure in other countries due to lack of medical expertise and equipment as well as lack of money. As well as this the poem also shows that in some cultures it is an increasing problem that forests and other natural habitats are being destroyed. This is a parallel to the economy of their country which is also being destroyed both due to the habitats being destroyed and also the mechanisation and automation of other countries.
In Charlotte O’Neil’s Song it shows the reader how hard the lives of the servants were, little better than prisoners or slaves, doing the lowliest work, at the beck and call of their masters. The poem contrasts the working girl with the idle employer, and shows the injustice of a system that split the rich and the poor into master and servant.
Both of these poems are well written and are a good insight into other cultures.
Word count = 966
