A poet that is very aware of transience Essay

We also see the loss of innocence in ‘Tear’, which is another memory from Kinsellas childhood about the time he lost his grandmother. This poem is very vivid and you can imagine you were right there in the room with him through it all. It was for that exact reason that I did not like ‘Tear’ as I found it emotional to the stage of disturbing, reminding me of the first person I lost who was close to me. The way he describes his reluctance to say goodbye to his grandmother is understandable, but I do not like how he describes her. â€Å"Drying mud†. I think that insulting someone who has passed is wrong and shouldn’t be done, even in poetry for imagery. I also dislike the how he says â€Å"smell of disused organs and sour kidney† as if the body was already rotting. Those along with the idea that it is more favourable to him to â€Å"kiss the damp† than his dying relative has caused me to strongly dislike this poem. However even though this poem is not for my tastes, the imagery is clear and the depiction of the pain that is experienced and loss of innocence that is lost when a relative close to you dies is very obvious in this poem. You can tell that the boy in the poem will not leave as the same person who entered. â€Å"Old age can digest anything. † He has been forever changed by his run in with death now that he is old enough to understand it, rather than when he was too young and his sister died. His â€Å"Child-animal grief† shows us this. I really liked studying Kinsella’s poetry even though I couldn’t relate to a lot of the themes that his poetry deals with, such as the negative effects of aging. However there was others that I could like how the dead haunt the present and how memories haunt us. I may be too young to have a lot of experience with getting â€Å"haunted† but there are a few things that, try as I might, cannot forget and I can relate to Kinsellas poetry in that way. He has shown that he is a thoughtful person and thinks about family and friends even when working. I love how he can so clearly depict thing that happened to him back when he was as young as 7 or 8 and I hope that I can do that too when I am older. Kinsella’s acceptance with death is inspiring and showed me that even when our body grows old and good looks are a thing of the past, you can still continue to carry yourself with pride and grace. It is for these reasons and many more that I have enjoyed studying Kinsella for my leaving cert course, and I plan to look further into his work when I have time after it. He is definitely a poet that I will try to remember when I am an old woman.