PoemoftheWeek

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Originally Posted by ShoutGrace

Unremembered is not the word I want to use, however. 'No prayers or incense rose. . . '. There is a word which sums up that feeling but my head isn't working right now.

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Dictionary.com says there is no such word as 'uncommemorated', which I find funny.

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Originally Posted by Shanna

Dictionary.com says there is no such word as 'uncommemorated', which I find funny.

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I think there used to be such a word but nobody bothered to write down anything about it. It's buried in an unmarked sentence somewhere.

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Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe

I think there used to be such a word but nobody bothered to write down anything about it. It's buried in an unmarked sentence somewhere.

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:lol: :lol:

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Dictionary.com says there is no such word as 'uncommemorated', which I find funny.

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So do you agree, Shanna? With my thought, that is.

There lies the difference between the two incidents described in the poem, and perhaps the purpose of the juxtaposition - that in the first, there are people around who ensure that the burning man was:

Permitted at least his pitiful dignity;
And such as were by made prayers in the name of Christ,
That shall judge all men, for his soul's tranquility.

Whereas in the second incident, there's no one. The Pole bled to death alone, unremembered, uncommemorated, nobody prayed for his soul and his body lay there for years afterwards, gathering soot. PL, in her first or second post about this poem, said somewhere that nothing's changed, in all these years. But I think the poet's point is that it has changed. Its grown worse.

ktd222, do I have this right? In this poem Hecht doesn’t care about the Nazi soldier? The fact that he has portrayed him as behaving with almost incomprehensible, unfathomable cruelty should not be taken as any indication that, in this particular poem (which Hecht has dedicated to Hannah Arendt), he is at all concerned with his behaviour? Is the soldier in any way responsible for his actions? Is he merely a victim of Nazi ideology, just like the people he buries alive or shoots?

Shout Grace,
You agree with ktd222’s comments (at least the ones you quoted). You also “don't see the Nazi soldier as part of what Hecht is trying to convey in the poem”. My own explanation for those last four lines appears to be different from yours (I think – I’m not really sure what you are saying). I think that there are no prayers or incense because there is no loving God. At the risk of offering more trite, maudlin and melodramatic bathos that only serves to demonstrate my desperate need for psychiatric treatment (an ad hominem comment that our reliable mods appear to have missed), I’ll quote Elie Wiesel’s Night:

“Never shall I forget that night, the first night in camp, which has turned my life into one long night, seven times cursed and seven times sealed. Never shall I forget that smoke. Never shall I forget the little faces of the children, whose bodies I saw turned into wreaths of smoke beneath a silent blue sky. Never shall I forget those flames which consumed my Faith forever. Never shall I forget that nocturnal silence which deprived me, for all eternity, of the desire to live. Never shall I forget those moments which murdered my God and my soul and turned my dreams to dust. Never shall I forget these things, even if I am condemned to live as long as God Himself. Never.”

Elie Wiesel Night

Obviously, Hecht isn’t simply saying that all the evil in the world is the result of one lone Nazi soldier - but surely you can’t believe that the poet ignores or even exonerates him? Of course it’s not about blaming an individual soldier – Hecht doesn’t individualise him, but to say that “the Nazi soldier” is not a “part of what Hecht is trying to convey in the poem” is rather extreme, wouldn’t you say?

I think we've all keyed on one of the poetic elements in use in this poem: passive voice. In this way, Hecht is able to focus our attention on the vivid horror in detail about what the Jews had to grow through, and at the same time, exclude the perpetrator from this act, as far as 'face time' and our attention is concerned. At first reading I also saw Nazis associated with these torturings being carring out on the Jews, but after further re-readings I found the Nazi(edit) purposefully absent from the poem. I obviously can't identify(emotionally) with a boot, or luger, or eye, but I can definitley identify with human beings.

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Originally Posted by Unnamable

Obviously, Hecht isn’t simply saying that all the evil in the world is the result of one lone Nazi soldier - but surely you can’t believe that the poet ignores or even exonerates him? Of course it’s not about blaming an individual soldier – Hecht doesn’t individualise him, but to say that “the Nazi soldier” is not a “part of what Hecht is trying to convey in the poem” is rather extreme, wouldn’t you say?

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I think that it would be. I more than likely misrelated my thoughts. I was saying that in my reading of the poem, the fact that the divine intervention did not occur, that no 'saving' interference burst through and onto the scene, and the author's reiteration of that fact, are what affected me most deeply.

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Originally Posted by Unnameable

I think that there are no prayers or incense because there is no loving God.

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As it relates to the author's intent, right? Meaning that both Hecht (implicitly), and Wiesel (explicitly), declared the absence (or disproof?) of God in these two works?


---EDIT--- Oh, are you saying that the 'prayers and incense' constitutes the act of divine interference that never took place?

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Yes, the thrust of this poem is not based on the concerns about the Nazi soldier.

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I think that I do agree with that. I think that the author is 'calling out' both the acts and the lack of providence. At least more so than the soldier.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

ktd222, do I have this right? In this poem Hecht doesn’t care about the Nazi soldier? The fact that he has portrayed him as behaving with almost incomprehensible, unfathomable cruelty should not be taken as any indication that, in this particular poem (which Hecht has dedicated to Hannah Arendt), he is at all concerned with his behaviour? Is the soldier in any way responsible for his actions? Is he merely a victim of Nazi ideology, just like the people he buries alive or shoots?

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Yes, the thrust of this poem is not based on the concerns about the Nazi soldier.

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More Light! More Light!
For Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt

Composed in the Tower before his execution
These moving verses, and being brought at that time
Painfully to the stake, submitted, declaring thus:
"I implore my God to witness that I have made no crime."

Nor was he forsaken of courage, but the death was horrible,
The sack of gunpowder failing to ignite.
His legs were blistered sticks on which the black sap
Bubbled and burst as he howled for the Kindly Light.

And that was but one, and by no means one of the worst;
Permitted at least his pitiful dignity;
And such as were by made prayers in the name of Christ,
That shall judge all men, for his soul's tranquility.

We move now to outside a German wood.
Three men are there commanded to dig a hole
In which the two Jews are ordered to lie down
And be buried alive by the third, who is a Pole.

Not light from the shrine at Weimar beyond the hill
Nor light from heaven appeared. But he did refuse.
A Luger settled back deeply in its glove.
He was ordered to change places with the Jews.

Much casual death had drained away their souls.
The thick dirt mounted toward the quivering chin.
When only the head was exposed the order came
To dig him out again and to get back in.

No light, no light in the blue Polish eye.
When he finished a riding boot packed down the earth.
The Luger hovered lightly in its glove.
He was shot in the belly and in three hours bled to death.

No prayers or incense rose up in those hours
Which grew to be years, and every day came mute
Ghosts from the ovens, sifting through crisp air,
And settled upon his eyes in a black soot.

-Anthony Hecht

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Moving the poem to the present page.

This is the first time I come across this poem so without any prior impressions: I find this poem somewhat detached but not lacking commitment or emotional depth. It makes me feel as if I am looking at some photos or watching those events through some camera lens; seeing only where camera is directed (the glove, the lugger, the boot, the chin, blistered legs...). Of course, there is someone holding that camera and my view of the scenes are limited with their directions.

Even though as a 'viewer', we can only see the things Hecht is pointing at, I don't think that he is putting the words into the reader's mouth either. I keep thinking that if I was watching this scene, this is how I would have described them had I been asked to be 'objective' (I am not claiming poetic grandiose here, which I have none, but simply saying that, in my opinion, the poet achieves to describe what he sees, without resorting to colourful adjectives etc). In the light of this description, I feel it is up to me, as a reader, to decide how I feel about all this and take a stand if necessary.

I agree with ktd that the change between the two scenes is very striking and one of the most noteworthy things in the poem, in my opinion. However, Hecht's purposeful detachment, while not lacking emotion, gets the first prize, I believe.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

“It condemns the German soldier by its amazing use of metonymy and the passive voice. The soldier is a void, to be inferred only from a Luger and its glove and a riding boot.”

Like a nicely fitting glove, that pretty much covers it. The officer has no shred of humanity – he is nothing more than the murderous ideology represented by the uniform in which he stands. He has become something less than human. Besides, if you were the Pole, what would you look at?

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I agree with this. Also the nice fitting glove suggests the efficiency of the Nazi.

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Originally Posted by Shanna

Exactly WHAT MELODRAMA are you going on about? And no, a greeting card does not sound trite because there is no space for development, you could have it go on for miles and it would still be as nauseating. It is trite because the idea at its core is a cliche, because it is based entirely on cheap values.

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Cheap values like love or honoring your mother or father or congratulating someone for a rite of passage? If you consider those cheap, I wonder what your core values are. They are trite becuase they have been deflated of individuality, not because they are cheap.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Obviously, Hecht isn’t simply saying that all the evil in the world is the result of one lone Nazi soldier - but surely you can’t believe that the poet ignores or even exonerates him? Of course it’s not about blaming an individual soldier – Hecht doesn’t individualise him, but to say that “the Nazi soldier” is not a “part of what Hecht is trying to convey in the poem” is rather extreme, wouldn’t you say?

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ktd, I have to agree with Unnamable here. The Nazi soldier is part of the drama. But you know you had me thinking about the ritual aspect to the drama you brought up earlier. I'm beginning to agree. The drama has a feeling of a choreographed ritual. In a religious ritual, say like the conversion of bread and wine to the body and blood of Christ every Sunday morning, the power behind the ritual is the Godhead itself. In Hecht's little drama, the "god in the machine" if you will, the power behind the ritual, is not really the Nazi soldier, but the Luger. And so the image of the Luger is paramount to that of the soldier.

I'm beginning to really like your understanding of what's transpiring as ritual.

Since it's become an issue, I thought I'd quote my earlier response to KTD's initial mention of the disembodied nazi (I think the comments got lost in an overly long post in which I tried to respond to too much at once :lol: ):

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Originally Posted by Petrarch's Love

Yes, KTD I had noticed that. There are some interesting perspectives on that in the essays Unnamable posted the link to. One critic read this as encouraging us to identify with the Nazi perpetrator. I had not immediately read it in that light myself, but when you think about it, this poem could very easily be seen from the perspective of the Nazi holding the lugar. All we really see of him is the gloved hand and the boot, just the way you would see yourself during this scene. Imagine that this is being filmed. The camera, which you the reader are looking through, would be positioned from the point of view of the Nazi holding the lugar.

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Whether you buy this argument or not I think it points to one reason for the minimalist description of the Nazi. Hecht doesn't want it to be an individual with a face who we can direct our hatred against. He's making it clear that the Nazi could be anyone who could wear a glove and boots. I think KTD is partly right in that this poem is not concerned with one individual Nazi soldier. It is, however, very much concened with Nazis (not chimps from Glasgow :D).

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Cheap values like love or honoring your mother or father or congratulating someone for a rite of passage? If you consider those cheap, I wonder what your core values are. They are trite becuase they have been deflated of individuality, not because they are cheap.

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Virg--I think in your response to Shanna you've hit on what makes the "trite" phrases of this poem work. What I tried to argue earlier (at too long length?) was that it is not the individual phrase, but the context of the phrase that makes it "trite." In this poem these phrases are being individualized. They are brought to bear in the context of two situations where they represent the sorts of "core values" you describe. They are reinvested with the individuality and meaning that makes them significant rather than maudlin.

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Originally Posted by ktd222

Yes, the thrust of this poem is not based on the concerns about the Nazi soldier.

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To which question is ‘yes’ a reply? You can play with semantics all you want but there is no doubt in my mind that Hecht is bothered by Nazis and I take the poem’s title to be significant. No one appears to have mentioned/ considered the title yet.

If you know some History, you will know that Weimar was considered the birthplace of Humanism. Goethe’s dying words (and I don’t want to get into a debate about whether or not these actually were his dying words; Hecht has used them as if they were) are a plea for enlightened humanism but in this poem, there is no “light from the shrine at Weimar beyond the hill”. The poem insistently excludes the possibility of the moral light of either God or Humanism:

“Not light from the shrine at Weimar”
“Nor light from heaven”
“No light, no light in the blue Polish eye”
“And settled upon his eyes in a black soot.”

The light of humanism is not only denied but also replaced by physical and moral darkness. That this appalling event takes place near Weimar makes it all the more terrible in Hecht's eyes. The Nazis held rallies in the National Theatre at Weimar as early as the mid 1920s.

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Originally Posted by “Shout Grace”

Oh, are you saying that the 'prayers and incense' constitutes the act of divine interference that never took place?

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I’m saying that there is no loving God – neither in the poem nor in my view of things. The world we inhabit is, as the comment from Kent in King Lear goes, “cheerless, dark and deadly.”

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

I agree with almost all of what you say and this isn’t nitpicking for the sake of it but when you say that “nothing has changed”, I would argue that, horribly, it has. Which one of the deaths in the poem strikes people as the worst and why?

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Originally Posted by Shanna

PL, in her first or second post about this poem, said somewhere that nothing's changed, in all these years. But I think the poet's point is that it has changed. Its grown worse.

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Since this came up twice I thought I'd respond (that is unless Virg's suggestion that you're one and the same sticks :D ). You're both right of course. In the context of the poem things have gotten worse. Maybe it would have occured to me to say so if I hadn't been reading Titus Andronicus for class at the time (it's been a cheery week of reading), but somehow in that context it seemed as though human nature itself hadn't changed as much as the efficiency of their methods. But I digress. You're absolutely right in the context of this poem, and I ought to have said as much. I think KTD is right in pointing to the lack of social and religious recognition as the key factor in setting up the second scene as even more horrific. I think there's also something more terrifying about the fact that it's psychologically and spiritually devastating. You always imagine that your comfort in such a situation would be that they can harm the body but never your inner core. In the Nazi situation the victims are stripped of everything.

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Originally Posted by Petrarch's Love

Virg--I think in your response to Shanna you've hit on what makes the "trite" phrases of this poem work. What I tried to argue earlier (at too long length?) was that it is not the individual phrase, but the context of the phrase that makes it "trite." In this poem these phrases are being individualized. They are brought to bear in the context of two situations where they represent the sorts of "core values" you describe. They are reinvested with the individuality and meaning that makes them significant rather than maudlin.

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Yes, I understood that when you made your argument before. However, I still think it's a cop-out on the poet's part to resort to trite phrases. The trite phrases may add this layer to the poem that you point out, but it's still not poetry, at least those phrases. He could have made the same point with original lines.

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Originally Posted by Petrarch's Love

unless Virg's suggestion that you're one and the same sticks :D

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Don’t you start as well! Shanna is clever but, well…

While I’m here – you made an outrageous claim earlier that everyone had assumed there was more than one Nazi – I didn’t and I demand an apology. Also, a Colobus monkey is NOT a chimp. Chimps are apes – monkeys aren’t, although both are Primates. You should know that as an expert in Renaissance Literature. Why does everyone misquote me?

(Do I really need to use a smiley?)

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He could have made the same point with original lines.

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He could not have made the same point with original lines. Original lines would not have resonated within the reader in the same way, as things that we've heard over and over again. Using the title of a well known hymn is going to have a much different effect on someone who's familiar with that hymn than anything the poet could have come up with.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Don’t you start as well! Shanna is clever but, well…

While I’m here – you made an outrageous claim earlier that everyone had assumed there was more than one Nazi – I didn’t and I demand an apology.

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Alas! I had no idea I'd fallen into the trap of generalization! Mea culpa, mea maxima culpa! My apologies, since I obviously meant everyone except The Unnamable One.

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Also, a Colobus monkey is NOT a chimp. Chimps are apes – monkeys aren’t, although both are Primates.

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And alas once more! Please pardon my innacuracy. I am but a humble mortal primate myself.

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You should know that as an expert in Renaissance Literature. Why does everyone misquote me?

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Because it's such fun?

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(Do I really need to use a smiley?)

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No more than I do I hope.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

To which question is ‘yes’ a reply?

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ktd222, do I have this right? In this poem Hecht doesn’t care about the Nazi soldier? The fact that he has portrayed him as behaving with almost incomprehensible, unfathomable cruelty should not be taken as any indication that, in this particular poem (which Hecht has dedicated to Hannah Arendt), he is at all concerned with his behaviour? Is the soldier in any way responsible for his actions? Is he merely a victim of Nazi ideology, just like the people he buries alive or shoots?

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Aren't all of your questions here concerning the Nazi soldier?

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Originally Posted by Petrarch's Love

He could not have made the same point with original lines. Original lines would not have resonated within the reader in the same way, as things that we've heard over and over again. Using the title of a well known hymn is going to have a much different effect on someone who's familiar with that hymn than anything the poet could have come up with.

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I said I could have accepted "Kindly Light" if it was the only melodramatic phrase. But what about : "drained away their souls", "quivering chin", "pityful dignity"?

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Don’t you start as well! Shanna is clever but, well…

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BUT WELL WHAT, EXACTLY..?

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Originally Posted by Xamonas Chegwe

I can't say I like this poem. But I doubt its purpose is to be liked.

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At first I had the same reaction. I did not like this. I also found myself saying things like - "well, it gives a reaction, but is it really poetry? It seems like more like prose. And I am not sure if I think it is good". Now, don´t hit me. I have given it careful thought and I think that it was a reaction to the documentary style, but also something caused by the emotions of the poem.
Hecht writes about things that are repulsive, and I think that my first response was a reaction to that. I was repulsed, and I guess that is what he wanted.

We all like to believe in a kindly light, or some last dignity. In this poem as PL wrote there is none.

If you have patience I will tell you an anecdote. It is related to the poem.
I was traveling in Germany, and came across a small town. It was fit for a postcard. They made good wine there and we had to much before deciding to go and try to visit the castle on the hill. The castle was not for visitors, but on the way half hidden was a small grave yard. The sign said that this was a resting place all all who died during the second world war in this small town. Jews, soldiers, prisoners of war, children and adults. Side by side. There was a poem on the wall. It was about brothers torn from brothers, and how heaven would at last "open the heart of peace". And it seemed like a closure at the time. A kind comfort, while looking at the lush trees and the lovely valley. And Hecht shows it to be a lie. There is no kindly light in this death. Just fear that breaks people as easily as bullets. We cry for light and get fire that turns our bones to ashes. And then we are gone, and the heaven does not open.

"No prayers or incense rose up in those hours
Which grew to be years, and every day came mute
Ghosts from the ovens, sifting through crisp air,
And settled upon his eyes in a black soot."

Anyhow, when Hecht states 'much casual death had drained away their souls,' I don't think that the draining away of their souls is only as a result of the ritual being performed by the Nazi guard without a religious basis on his part, but also the opportunity given to the victim to speak to his god.
In the first ritual the victim is permitted this 'pitiful dignity':And such as were by made prayers in the name of Christ,/That shall judge all men, for his soul's tranquility.
While in the latter ritual the opportunity for prayer is not even given: No prayers or incense rose up in those hours

And I think this gets to the matter of the poem: that prayers are in some way needed to acknowledge to Christ that one believes in Him; therefore, Christ will judge all men's fate based on the victim's soul's tranquility.

So the last paragraph goes as follows:
No prayers or incense rose up in those hours
Which grew to be years, and every day came mute
Ghosts from the ovens, sifting through crisp air,
And settled upon his eyes in a black soot.

The prayer or incense is what rises up to speak with God. Just as in the beginning paragraph when Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt composed 'these moving verses,' the verses is itself an acknowledgement of Christ, as well what moves up and speaks directly with Christ for you.
There is movement in this poem!
And in the end I think that part of the victim, the 'acknowledging part', is what has drained away.
And in the same way, this is why the 'Ghosts from the ovens' at the end are mute. Because the opportunity for acknowledgment of Christ in life(aloud) is lost by not standing behind one's faith and speaking up.
Therefore you have this cycle at the end of the poem where the Ghost continually seem to try to rise, but instead sift down through crisp air, 'and settle upon his eyes in a black soot.' The ghosts themselves have, in a way, lost the 'light', and now is described as 'black soot'; which incidently is what is covering the Polish eye from seeing light.

PS: tell me where I'm rambling and I will try to clear up my thoughts.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

If you are still there, kilted exile, the Colobus monkey from Glasgow was not in any way meant as a slur on your good self. :D

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Indeed not after all there are few monkeys in glasgow, however, there are many uneducated apes but most of them prefer primitive weapons such as hammers and sharpened golf clubs to the confusing gun with all its moving parts.

(just as a point of reference, in glasgow terminology I would be refered to as a "hun", strange eh?)

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Originally Posted by Virgil

I said I could have accepted "Kindly Light" if it was the only melodramatic phrase. But what about : "drained away their souls", "quivering chin", "pityful dignity"?

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In one of my earlier posts I addressed how I thought at least one of these lines, the "quivering chin," worked as an example of a purposeful rejection of more elevated language in this poem. It's sometimes not really a matter of what phrases a poet is using as much as the way he/she is employing them, and I think that what others have been referring to as "documentary style" diction works well towards creating the effect this poet is striving toward. I simply don't feel that they're melodramatic lines and you do. I suppose we may just have to leave it at that. I'd be interested in hearing what you liked about this poem though, since you said earlier that there were some things you thought good.

Ktd222,
Why is it that the Jews do not hesitate in burying the Pole alive even after he has taken a stance by refusing to do the same with them? The answer Hecht provides is that “much casual death had drained away their souls”, which I take to mean that they are so desensitised by the treatment they have previously received as members of a race that has been systematically annihilated, so brutalised that they have no core values of decency left. They are utterly broken. The only thing that I see in this poem that could be described as trite is the offering of religious condolence.

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Originally Posted by “ktd222”

The prayer or incense is what rises up to speak with God. Just as in the beginning paragraph when Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt composed 'these moving verses,' the verses is itself an acknowledgement of Christ, as well what moves up and speaks directly with Christ for you.
There is movement in this poem!

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I have no idea what you mean here. First of all, Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt did not compose any verses (at least not in this poem – I have no idea if they wrote limericks to each other in private). They are two people to whom Hecht has dedicated his poem. Do you actually read what people post? I provided information about them in #946. They are not participants in the poem, if that is what the garbled comments above are actually saying. Earlier you said, “If Hecht did not say the German soldier was holding the Luger then how are you suppose (sic) to know?” and then added, “Have you heard of the word 'assumption' and the phrase 'use what your (sic) given'?” Correct me if I am wrong but you appear to be saying that we should only focus on what is provided in the poem. Yet now you have no qualms about making a statement like “the Ghost (sic) continually seem to try to rise”. Where is the evidence for this? What does it mean, anyway? Are you suggesting in some way that Hecht’s purpose in this poem is to show us the true way to God and offer us some kind of religious hope? There is no hope offered. All light has been extinguished, which is why I said that I found the poem unanswerable.

Your comments lead me to believe that you have read the critics in the links I posted above. May I suggest you read them again but this time make understanding them your focus, rather than simply trying to ransack them for an argument.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Ktd222Your comments lead me to believe that you have read the critics in the links I posted above. May I suggest you read them again but this time make understanding them your focus, rather than simply trying to ransack them for an argument.

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I have read none of the sort. I've contributed to a lot of poems in this thread and not only to the ones analyzed by the site you suggest-which makes me think your the one who goes on the internet and finds an answer that matches yours before you give people the post to the site.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Ktd222,
Why is it that the Jews do not hesitate in burying the Pole alive even after he has taken a stance by refusing to do the same with them? The answer Hecht provides is that “much casual death had drained away their souls”, which I take to mean that they are so desensitised by the treatment they have previously received as members of a race that has been systematically annihilated, so brutalised that they have no core values of decency left. They are utterly broken. The only thing that I see in this poem that could be described as trite is the offering of religious condolence.

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Geez, look who is analyzing the poem like it's a history report.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Ktd222 I have no idea what you mean here. First of all, Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt did not compose any verses (at least not in this poem – I have no idea if they wrote limericks to each other in private). They are two people to whom Hecht has dedicated his poem. Do you actually read what people post?

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Good, you focus on that background information and not the poem.

How else would you read the opening lines:
For Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt
Composed in the Tower before his execution
These moving verses,

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

Ktd222
Do you actually read what people post? I provided information about them in #946. They are not participants in the poem, if that is what the garbled comments above are actually saying. Earlier you said, “If Hecht did not say the German soldier was holding the Luger then how are you suppose (sic) to know?” and then added, “Have you heard of the word 'assumption' and the phrase 'use what your (sic) given'?” Correct me if I am wrong but you appear to be saying that we should only focus on what is provided in the poem. Yet now you have no qualms about making a statement like “the Ghost (sic) continually seem to try to rise”. Where is the evidence for this? What does it mean, anyway? Are you suggesting in some way that Hecht’s purpose in this poem is to show us the true way to God and offer us some kind of religious hope? There is no hope offered. All light has been extinguished, which is why I said that I found the poem unanswerable.

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Ya, I read your post, with a spark of analysis here and there, and then your posts were drowned in useless information.
Why don't you read these lines from the poem:
No prayers or incense rose up in those hours
Which grew to be years, and every day came mute
Ghosts from the ovens, sifting through crisp air,
And settled upon his eyes in a black soot.
Its all there. And what is going on in this last stanza correlates back to the first ritual. I'm really sorry you can't see the movement in the poem.

There is hope offered. The person with 'legs were blistered sticks on which the black sap bubbled and burst' seems to still hold firm to his 'faith' in the midst of all the pain the person is experiencing.

But the Jews also seem to go through a sort of horrific ending to their lives, yet I don't hear any of them reaffirming and standing behind their faith.

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Originally Posted by “ktd222”

Good, you focus on that background information and not the poem.

How else would you read the opening lines:
For Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt
Composed in the Tower before his execution
These moving verses,

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First of all, I wouldn’t set it out differently from the way the poet has done:

More Light! More Light!
For Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt

Composed in the Tower before his execution

Then I would consider the possibility that Composed could be an adjective as well as a verb.

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Originally Posted by “ktd222”

I have read none of the sort.

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Perhaps you should consider doing so?

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Originally Posted by “ktd222”

-which makes me think your the one who goes on the internet and finds an answer that matches yours before you give people the post to the site.

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I don’t need to go searching for anything other than the verbatim quotations (I like to offer accurate quotation): I’ve read a lot of books, you see.

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Originally Posted by “ktd222”

Geez, look who is analyzing the poem like it's a history report.

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The fact that Hecht has dedicated his poem to two actual historical characters, has quoted the dying words of a third and bases his poem on a historical event is obviously irrelevant and a poem about the atrocities of the Holocaust should equally obviously not consider historical reality – poems exist in an ahistorical, aesthetic void, don’t they?

As I said earlier, when in a hole…

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Originally Posted by ktd222

No prayers or incense rose up in those hours
Which grew to be years, and every day came mute
Ghosts from the ovens, sifting through crisp air,
And settled upon his eyes in a black soot.
Its all there. And what is going on in this last stanza correlates back to the first ritual. I'm really sorry you can't see the movement in the poem.

There is hope offered. The person with 'legs were blistered sticks on which the black sap bubbled and burst' seems to still hold firm to his 'faith' in the midst of all the pain the person is experiencing.

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It is strange. We quote the same part and get different lessons from it.
I thought that the idea was that hope did not help him, faith did not help because no kind light came, and that the last stanza confirms that lack of hope. I thought the poems title asking for light was an echo of his plea.
So I can´t see the movement you refer to - at least not in the same way as you do.

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Originally Posted by ktd222

and then your posts were drowned in useless information.

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:lol: :lol: :lol:

I'm sure Hecht would agree with you. That's why he bothered to mention Arendt and quote Goethe.

Miss Jones, take a letter:

“Dear Mr. Hecht, I liked your poem but where are the similes and metaphors, where is the onomatopoeia, where is the opportunity to reduce it to a technical exercise in literary criticism? I’ve just learned how to scan poetry but you blind me with historical information. How do you expect me to sound clever when you insist on mentioning such useless things? Still, it’s a nice poem about hope.”

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

First of all, I wouldn’t set it out differently from the way the poet has done:

More Light! More Light!
For Heinrich Blucher and Hannah Arendt

Composed in the Tower before his execution

Then I would consider the possibility that Composed could be an adjective as well as a verb.

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The same poem that I printed out has those two lines above as part of the same stanza.

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Perhaps you should consider doing so?

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No, seems to have messed you up pretty good.

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I don’t need to go searching for anything other than the verbatim quotations (I like to offer accurate quotation): I’ve read a lot of books, you see.

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Wow, good for you buddy...and?

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The fact that Hecht has dedicated his poem to two actual historical characters, has quoted the dying words of a third and bases his poem on a historical event is obviously irrelevant and a poem about the atrocities of the Holocaust should equally obviously not consider historical reality – poems exist in an ahistorical, aesthetic void, don’t they?

As I said earlier, when in a hole…

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As I showed in my post, the copy I have have the two lines you mentioned in the same stanza which changes the meaning of the opening lines.
If I look at the poem with the opening two lines as is, then yes, the poem becomes a dedication; but that still doesn't take away that it's 'moving verses'.
Yes, it is irrelevant. It's a poem, and poems have poetic elements: thats what I'm looking for more than background information.

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Originally Posted by ktd222

Yes, it is irrelevant. It's a poem, and poems have poetic elements: thats what I'm looking for more than background information.

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That hole just keeps getting bigger - you'll soon be through to the Earth's core. Be careful your shovel doesn't melt. :D

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Originally Posted by Isagel

I thought that the idea was that hope did not help him, faith did not help because no kind light came, and that the last stanza confirms that lack of hope. I thought the poems title asking for light was an echo of his plea.

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And in this you are right, of course.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

:lol: :lol: :lol:

I'm sure Hecht would agree with you. That's why he bothered to mention Arendt and quote Goethe.

Miss Jones, take a letter:

“Dear Mr. Hecht, I liked your poem but where are the similes and metaphors, where is the onomatopoeia, where is the opportunity to reduce it to a technical exercise in literary criticism? I’ve just learned how to scan poetry but you blind me with historical information. How do you expect me to sound clever when you insist on mentioning such useless things? Still, it’s a nice poem about hope.”

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Where is Goethe in the poem?
Yes, I think he would appreciate a person who is able to see what type of poetic elements he uses.

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Originally Posted by The Unnamable

I’ve just learned how to scan poetry but you blind me with historical information. How do you expect me to sound clever when you insist on mentioning such useless things? Still, it’s a nice poem about hope.”

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Its sad to say but what I've just learned about poetry seems to be more than you know about poetry.