Literary Response

In may, the root tells of his/her chance encounter with a copper drumhead on the drive appearance wholeness night as it lay well-disposed under the street lamp, silent and extend and timidityless. Having long wanted to visit one, he/she kneels down transfixed, fascinated by its bad grace, its be unlike the super acid swart and green and garter snakes that evince except shyness here is a hearty termination striker within branchs reach. The condition remembers non its unambiguous markings or size or other(a) physical characterstic other than the fact that its head is wedge-shaped and fell back to the unpredicted slimness of a neck, its body thick, distort and electric. He/she moves a little, catching the animals economic aid it jerks as if to attack, and he/she jumps back. The snake flows on across the r come forthe and down into the dark, leaving him/her alone to theorise the woods and the stars.Only a reptile, nonwithstan ructiong what tactile propertyings it does farm Meeting the copperhead is an exciting stick that leaves one more capable of appreciating animation. I hope to see everything in this earth in the first place I die, says the writer, speaking of a hope that is uniquely hu human beings. The poem captures an photo, a feeling, and by so doing prints an image of the poet as well curious, contemplative, daring, desirous to embark on a quest to discover everything that brio has to offer.Almost everyone sh ares the authors attentiveness to see everything in this instauration before he/she dies, like the boy in cutting edge Dykes The Blue extremum who, seeing his own burial good deal already altogether in whollyotted to him, puzzles terribly restless, long to see the world and to taste cheer before his time comes to sleep downstairs the elm tree where his future cemetery lies. Such, to my mind, is the authors yearning she is wasted to the copperhead as a moth is worn- come out to a flame, or a soldier lur ed to the battlefield, not by dreams of glory and honor, exactly by some vague ruling that a pose-to-face confrontation with death would make him better appreciate the gratification of sprightliness. merely why does one shoot to cheek for excitement in things as wild, as unpredictable, as deadly as a copperhead? perhaps, humans are worn to the snake by the documentaryization that they have a thing in unwashed a vulnerability without the fang. Remove mans weapons, and he is provided a feeble animal. Of course, one apprize gyp everything about(predicate) snakes through books or the meshing or the science lab. The author, if he/she wants to, provide view the copperhead in its wish-wash cage as it sleeps, coiled and undisturbed. But a snake in the open, in particular in ones yard, forever and a day strikes terror.Like the serpent in the garden of Eden, it suggests cunning, mystery, power. gliding and winding and recoiling, it has a beauty that seduces and mesmerizes. bingle must see a substantial snake up close and personalized to have a glimpse of the real world. In this regard, to see everything does not merely amount to viewing things through a microscope, or watching a social lion in its kingdom in the veld from the safety of a car. It is akin to solicit danger for the love of being scared, to feel ones blood impulsion upon flood tide face to face with real- liveliness demons. It is not seeing the world the way a tourist normally does, nor as a nature lover admires butterflies. Nor is it a judicious mans courtship of danger. The author does not go out of his/her way to meet the snake it happens by chance. His/her wish to see everything in this world does not necessarily refer to making a solo voyage across the ocean, or free-falling from a cliff, or climbing the Himalayas because its in that location. It is not seeking danger for its sake, but finding comfort in legal transfer when real danger comes along.The authors desire to see everything in this world before dying echoes Thoreaus self-admonition on his quest, living by himself in the woods, to roll in the hay deep and suck out all the marrow of behavior . . . to drive life into a corner, and reduce it to its lowest equipment casualty (Walden). Mays author may not have gone to the effect of exploring the earths frontiers, at to the lowest degree not that we know of, to see everything in this planet his/hers is precisely a hope, by chance a childish one, for nobody rat ever hope to see everything in a multiple of lifetimes. It is a goodish voice, nonetheless, emanating from within, that is incessantly heard above the din of humanity.In a sense, May is Rubaiyat-like in its rest make the most of what we may provided spend,/ Before we too into the Dust Descend. Of course, May never tells us to indulge before we die, nor does it preach or call our attention to the plight of endangered species. But it gives an impregnateion of urgency life is too laconic to be squandered on short pursuits.The author sees the copperhead not in some desert but in an inhabited town, perhaps a metropolis fringed by woods, illumined not by the sun or moon but by a street lamp. Perhaps it is a reminder of our affinity with the wild. possibly it is one way of telling us that material comforts and soft living have deprived us of the outmoded need to go out and face our monsters. After the copperhead has flown across the road and down into the dark, the author stood a small-arm, auditory modality to the little(a) sounds of the woods and looking at the stars. He/she notes that after excitement we are so restful and that when the thumb of fear lifts, we are so alive. Restfulness and vivacity are the viewing of excitement and fear. But is it possible to become restful and alive at the same time? Meditative, or thoughtful, would be more apt. One can be brim with life and excitement even when throttle to a sickbed.The encounter with the copperh ead heightens the authors appreciation of natures other gifts, such as the small sounds of the woods and a view of the stars. At night, one can hear go stirrings in the forest as pirana and prey make their nocturnal rounds a squirrel being caught in a prairie wolfs jaws, a rat being snatched by an owl on the wing. unless humans do not truly know, cannot really comprehend the life-and-death struggles that go across in their midst unless they too copy the role of predator or prey, slayer or victim. The former is excited by the fact that it has power over the watery the latter by the fact that it can outrun, even outwit, its pursuer. Has this not been the lot of all creatures since time began? In meeting the copperhead, the author unexpectedly catches a glimpse of what life really consisted of before civilization. By listening to the woods, one can hear the coming and going of life. By looking at the stars, one can wish life would go on forever.Every human at some point early in life feels an itch to set out and conquer the world, like the frog in the parable of the well, or like the pioneers in the old West who could not settle down despite the abundance of indorse and the rich land of the frontier they always wanted to move on, to find out what lay over the horizon all the way to the Pacific. That is mans nature, and slide fastener has stopped him not if it took all the copperheads in the world to go and see what there is to find, even if it would only lead to thwarting and despair. Every person yearns to find his/her El Dorado.May suggests endless possibilities, formerly-in-a-lifetime chances, secrets waiting to be discovered, if only we are willing to face them. sidereal day after day we meet common people that do not impress us by their shyness, ordinary people, muffled people. The daily routine becomes a hair and before we know it we are old, confined to a wheelchair, unsure of whether or not we had ever lived at all. But once in a rare w hile we come across a deadly copperhead.May is all about someones feelings after a brush with a poisonous snake. Maybe it is not about crossing the Sahara or climbing devolve on Everest after all, but simply a matter of having to confront our own copperheads as we chance upon them in our everyday lives.WORKS CITEDDyke/The_Blue_Flower/Khayyam, Omar. The Rubaiyat. 31 May 2007.