Friday, October 16, 2009

Firebase Red

I chose this poem because it confused me. As a read on through it a few times i still couldn't understand the first 2 stanzas but the last 2 stanzas were very powerful and stuck out to me. This poem shows a sentimental side of it all with the way the boots are portrayed. In the 3rd stanza
Willie asks him what he did with his army stuff. He gave it away to the goodwill and that seemed very strange to me that he would give something like that away. Then he goes on and says "i keep a pair in the back of my head"( referring to a pair of boots). I think this shows that he wanted to forget everything that happened in the war by giving his stuff away. He cant actually forget it because it is always in the back of his head. The last line is very powerful and gave me chills as i read it because it seemed wierd but that is how he remembered it. The boots to him remind him of vietnam.

2 comments:

  1. It is interesting that of all the things he chooses to remember he settles on the boots. I mean, boots aren't something you would think of as important to someone, and yet it is this soldier's reminder of what he experienced in the war.

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  2. kristen, exactly, those last lines really brought things together for me, too, as often happens in a good poem. nice job!

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