The cry I bring down from the hills
belongs to a girl still burning
inside my head. At daybreak
- she burns like a piece of paper.
in a thigh-shaped valley.
A skirt of flames
dances around her
at dusk.
- We stand with our hands
while she burns
- like a sack of dry ice.
She burns like a cattail torch
dipped in gasoline.
She glows like the fat tip
of a banker's cigar,
- silent as quicksilver.
at nightfall.
She burns like a shot glass of vodka.
She burns like a field of poppies
at the edge of a rain forest.
She rises like dragonsmoke
to my nostrils.
She burns like a burning bush
driven by a godawful wind.
Yusef Komunyakaa's poem 'You and I are Disappearing contains ominous and mystical language to portray the lose of a girl from the world. The speaker still carries the pain of the death of a girl in his mind. The speaker still hear the "cries" of the girl "still burning in his head." This poem demonstrates people's struggles to let go of a lost loved one. The pain inside his mind is like a dangerous fire burning inside of him.
ReplyDeleteThe frightening and sinmple diction of Yusef Komunyakaa in the poem "You and I are Disappering," alludes to the idea of a girl being burned by fire. The speaker does not state wheather or not the girl lived or not but only that this is a very terrifying memory. Overall a very good poem.
ReplyDeleteThe poem appears as a haunting memory to the writer who carries "the cry I bring down from the hills" in his mind. He saw a girl burn and his mind appears to race with similes comparing how she burned to other objects. The poem is a tormenting remembrance to him.
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