Dictating Popularity

Who is to say what's popular or cool? Everyone has different opinions about what and who is considered cool, but why can't we be able to dictate it ourselves? When it comes to creative writing, or really anything considered creative, this is the perfect time for people to talk about what they think is cool, or even what's not cool.

Although Gwendolyn Brooks's poem We Real Cool seems to highlight the major things that are considered "cool", such as skipping school. stay out late, etc., that's her own opinion. On the contrary, I seem to believe that Dean Martin is the King of Cool and not many people would agree with me nowadays, but turning that into something cool into art isn't always too easy, but we can try as much as we wish.

The Effects of Poetry

Literature will always have an effect on people, whether ti reaches to the deepest parts of their heart and touch them in ways that they never quite expected, or if it makes them laugh. In a similar respect, some people treat reading both poetry and any other sort of literature, such as fiction, as a task instead of leisure as most do.

Randall Jarrell wrote a poem entitled The Death of a Ball Turret Gunner about a young man in World War 2 as a gunner in a B-17 or B-24 airplane. The poem starts as simple as leaving home and going into the war, but by the final line of the poem, the disturbing line of "When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose", which creates a very disturbing image for anyone.

If someone who has never done background research on World War 2 may be taken a bit by surprise by this and though everyone is aware of how violent it was, they may not expect such an abrupt end. I've done plenty of research on World War 2, so this came as no surprise but it always creates a sort of curiosity.

Cathedral by Raymond Carver

Raymond Carver writes an interesting narrative that, in a way, seems to be a summary of how we all feel when we are around someone with a disability or illness. There are people who are secure in being around people like this, but most feel some sort of discomfort. The narrator immediately seems to feel that discomfort while his wife's only concern is for the blind man that she has come to know and care about like he was indeed a part of their family.

Although it isn't exactly the same,  I've had more than my share of family members who were either very sick or friends that had some sort of disability that made it difficult to visit with them. In the story, the narrator and Robert begin to draw a cathedral together, and this is a perfect example that just because there's something different about them, they really aren't that different, and small things such as drawing and art can create very important bonds.