'Hotel Room 12th Floor' By Norman MacCaig

".... A million lit windows, all ups and acrosses." This is effective in adding to the image of lines two to four, as it is a simile. The lit windows contrasting with the midnight darkness may produce the appearance of a crossword.

"The wildest of war hoops continually ululating through the glittering canyons and gulches." This again is a simile as it can be considered to be like a fight in an alleyway between the skyscrapers, as the height of skyscrapers can cause the appearance of canyons and gulches.

"... The brocket bones, the harsh screaming from coldwater flats, the blood glazed on sidewalks." This is effective in showing the reality of midnight in a major city such as New York. The blood glazed on sidewalks would suggest that that it had been violent as if it were spread out, but had been done in the past as the blood had been dried in.

"The frontier is never somewhere else. And no stockades can keep the midnight out." This would show that the writer was a very cautious even paranoid person as he felt that you were never protected from what was to come which in a sense is very true. I came to this conclusion because as the writer said the frontier is never something else, which means that to the skyscrapers we are tiny, to the city the skyscrapers are tiny, to the world the city is tiny and to the universe the world is tiny.

I feel that in this poem Norman MacCaig has reached his poetic goal of communication, which of course is the poet's metier. Something that MacCaig is the master of his art in, effortlessly reaching his audience.