Poetry response #2

Dana Cogshell
Locano
AP Literature
26 September 2016


In the poem "I had heard it's a fight" by Edwin Denby in chapter 9 of sound and sense The speaker talks about naivete or going against your better judgement . When Denby writes" The afternoon it touched me  /  It sneaked up like it was a sweet thrill " (5-6) . This shows misguidance I think The speaker thinks this thing is good and nice ,at first thrilling but they are mistaken. This (mistake) is shown in the following lines" So I let it come just a wee  / Mite closer, Though I knew what it was , hell  " (7-8). These lines show the speaker knows subconciously this thing that they are accepting into their life or their arms as Denby puts is bad but still they are tempted to trust so they let it gain entry little by little but they know deep down this thing they are accepting is bad. I also think this poem shows blindness we are blinded by our thoughts and our beliefs ultimately if we want to believe something is good we allow ourselves to look past all the bad it does. When Denby writes the words "I had heard it's a fight " (1), It makes me feel as if the speaker was blinded that they had heard it was a fight but didn't conciously know they were involved they were blinded so they can't feel being beat down and all the bad it's doing to you because you are on this high as if this thing is so magnificient that you literally cannot make the observation for yourself so you are left with hearsay of people watching as you sit idly by as this thing beats you down. This is ultimately why I like the poem it speaks of something so human. It speaks of our process of accepting things that ultimately cause pandemonium and disaster. We want to believe lots of things are good and want to ignore all the bad it has done. I also love this poem for the way it is written the imagery used and the use of fragments and random capitalization makes it eye catching making it easier to understand and feel what Denby is trying to convey as he wrote it.