Bruce Dawe Poetry

The quality and importance of life are looked at by most as a valuable and great gift, but this perception of someone’s life is stated differently by the two poets, David Malouf and Bruce Dawe. The poems Suburban and Homecoming express life through the eyes of two separate groups, one being a ‘stereotypical’ individual and the other, a group of men fighting for their own lives. Poetry offers many hidden meanings within their stories, Suburban and Homecoming are no different offering two distinct takes on the meaning of life. Whether that be shown through war, or a Sunday morning after a long night out, both poems convey the emotions of life, both positively and negatively.

Bruce Dawe, an Australian known poet, born 1930 is still one of the biggest selling and most highly regarded poets of Australia. His ability to write such influential poems has made an impact on a number of people, as each poem can be related to the ordinary living lives of Australians throughout the years. Bruce Dawe's poems are interesting because they comment on the lives of ordinary people. This statement is agreed on. In relation to the statement, three key poems can be linked being Enter Without So Much as Knocking (1959), Homo Suburbiensis (1964) and Drifters (1968).

The word “homecoming” is universally associated with a celebration of the returned and is linked to feelings of happiness and anticipation. Dawe however, employs this word ironically as the “homecoming” described in the poem correlates to the death and mourning of the soldiers who fought in the Vietnam War and depicts the arrival of their nameless bodies. Through establishing this irony Dawe is about to effectively capture the brutal reality of war and highlight the emotional trauma associated with its dehumanising

Both poems show the effects war has on witnesses even when their time in the conflict is deemed to be over. The extreme nature of war and the equally strong emotions and trauma that stick with survivors are conveyed in both of these

War affects many people, too many people that they can't name them all. In the poem Homecoming by Bruce Dawe, it portrays the many people that were affected by war through collective pronouns. The poem frequently uses collective pronouns ‘they’re and their’ to show that there are too many people to name. The phrase ‘wide web of suburbs’ shows that there are many innocent lives that are affected by war. Bruce Dawes makes them human by identifying their haircuts “curly heads, kinky-hairs, crew-cuts, balding non-coms”.

Homecoming (1968), a narrative piece of elegy by Bruce Dawe delineates the Australian soldiers who died in Vietnam war. The whole poem’s tone appears to be ironic and the tempo is inexorable as if the appalling episodes of soldiers are occurring unremittingly. The title itself is ironic because when I think of homecoming it’s something celebratory and lots of partying. But within this poem, Dawe doesn’t

Homecoming By donald bruce dawe The 1968 poem Homecoming By donald bruce dawe portrays a negative response to australians involvement in the vietnam war he shows his attitudes though vivid visual and aural poetic techniques. through the abundance of that features in this taunting poem reviles to the reader how morally outrageous war is the vietnam war in particular. The title alone has the effect of irony on the reader because Homecoming is tend to be a happy experience Like a celebration or heroic reception for a great achievement, the poetic technique imagery, Personification and simile is used in the line ‘’

The concluding line in Bruce Dawe’s “The Homecoming”, complements the respectful and, at times, resentful tone the speaker adopts. Opening with a comparatively broad statement; “they are bringing them home” – alludes to the story of the soldiers’ decent home. Moreover, by utilising the phrase “they”, the anonymity of the soldiers is also augmented, leaving the reader to again question who exactly “they” are. Being brought “home” – a place that symbolises love/family, was a nationwide debate at the time of the Vietnam War. Protests were all over the country, arguing for the return of our soldiers to safety. Only this wasn’t about the soldiers’ family - they were dead – home was just a way of saying: out of danger. A long pause, then follows,

Bruce Dawe uses expressive language features to show the harshness of his poem. Dawe uses a variety of descriptive words to express his opinion,

The overall theme in Walt Whitman’s “Drum Taps” is about the way war consumes everything and monopolizes every facet of life; particularly the land the war is fought on. When analyzing the poem, the first stanza talks about the movement of war from the farms, the second stanza talks about the progression of war from the farm to the city. In stanza three this journey continues through the battlefield, through the halls of power and finally into the homes, moving from the public to private spheres of life.

Fortunately, for the author the tides turned as he climbed his way from a copy shop boy to obtaining a job in the newspaper department. Here, Guest published his first poem to a column in the newspaper and launched his career from there to eventually end up broadcasting for NBC radio. Guest promoted his experience through his works of poetry to inspire his audiences. In this poem, readers feel the weight of Guest’s deplorable childhood represented as the “impossible task”. However, readers also experience the prosperous feeling of success as the author overcomes the impossible task.

Owen recalls his group being physically and mentally overwhelmed by the toil of battle in the first stanza of the poem using illustrative similes and alliteration, “Bent Double, like old beggars under sacks, / Knock-Kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through the sludge,” that presents a scene to the reader of soldiers who had gone to war with a strong nationalist idea, but ended up facing the horrible reality with induced shell shock (Owen 1-2). The language of the first stanza may surprise the reader, as it is barely appropriate for the glory of the battlefield where heroes are supposed to be found. As the soldiers lethargically persevere, or “marched asleep” through the blood that surrounded them, the slow rhythm of stanza allows the reader to somewhat empathize with the rugged troops to the point to where both sides may not have quickly grasped the grave calamity that is soon to occur, especially with the use of “softly” in “gas-shells dropping softly behind,” to prove that point (Owen

In the first stanza the young soldier is depicted in a dark, isolated state as he sits in his wheelchair. Almost immediately the reader learns that the soldier has lost his legs in a battle. Owen casts a pall over this young man with the depiction of sad voices of boys echoing throughout the park, perhaps as they echoed on the battlefield. The voices throw him back into his memories, which is what will constitute the rest of the poem until the last few lines. Words such as "waiting" and "sleep" reinforce the sense that this soldier's life is interminable to him

The first aspect of the poem that caught my attention was how reflective and nostalgic the soldier portrayed himself. One prime example of this occurring is when the soldier states, “Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;” (12). Here, he is referring to how much pleasure he had in the presence of his homeland, and his desire to go back. Additionally, it is evident that the soldier is longing to return home when

The poems achieve that delicate balance between being cliché, sentimental and being full of self-pity; and expressing empathy. This is done because though the overview of the poem is simple and direct, there are some strong words which are sprinkled throughout with such apt accuracy that they intensify the powerful feelings that a man experiences when he is torn between his past and present