Edward

=Edward's Analysis:= QWERTYUI //Mulberry Fields// is a piece of poetry written by Lucille Clifton that reflects upon her upbringing and the traditions of that time. Clifton’s poems have generally revolved around topics such as the history of African-Americans and her own personal stories all of which can remind of about the sorrows of the past but also hope in the future. Her distinct, low-key writing style is easily recognizable in this poem—it had no meter, rhyme, or punctuation. //Mulberry Fields// is not filled with a great deal of heavy symbolism but is simply passing on an old tale about slavery and the production in the fields. QWERTYUI The poem is written in one complete paragraph but has two separate sections. The first half describes the fields of an old manor and the other half goes into a bit more detail by stating Clifton’s opinions and explaining the significance of the previous half. QWERTYUI Typical of Clifton’s style, //Mulberry Fields// does not contain altogether too many literary devices but she does manage to convey a lot through the few that she does incorporate into her poems. Her use of imagery is very interesting because her descriptions of the fields and the manor in the first section are not excessively explicit and yet they are capable of forming a very clear picture in the reader’s mind. For instance, the author writes QWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWER QWERTYUI stones and piled them into a barn they say that the rocks were shaped QWERTYUI some of them scratched with triangles and other forms they QWERTYUI must have been trying to invent some new language they say QWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWERTYUIQWER in order to describe how they began to build a wall and images of scratched up rocks instantly spring to mind. Repetition also plays a major role in both the top and bottom half. Clifton uses “they say” and “i say” extensively throughout the poem as a way of putting extra emphasis on her words as well as shifting the poem from a descriptive phase: “…they say / the rocks went to build that wall there guarding the manor…”, to an opinionated phase: “i say the stones marked an old tongue and it was called eternity”. As mentioned before, she uses little symbolism and the bit that she does use is generally simple to tell what she’s referring to. QWERTYUI The structure of the poem itself is different than most poetry but much like Clifton’s other works. She uses no rhyme, no meter, no forms of punctuation, breaks the line off at seemingly random intervals, and uses elongated spaces in the place of periods. This is not unique to this poem only but still has the effect that the style brings—it presents her messages in a clear and concise manner and also makes them stronger than they would seem otherwise. QWERTYUI Clifton’s poetry has often been described as storytelling and //Mulberry Fields// seems to fit into this category as well. In the second half of the poem, Clifton's personal voice is heard and she begins to express her own opinions. Although the poem itself doesn’t clearly state the term ‘slavery’ until that last quarter of the poem, the fact that the poem is dealing with slavery becomes clearer and clearer as the poem progresses. Parts of the poem are also viewed in a new light when slavery is revealed. For example, “they thought the field was wasting” and “crops refused to grow” could simply be attributed to bad luck or poor soil, but once “…moulders one called alice whose great grandson is old now / too and refuses to talk about slavery…” is mentioned, readers begin to understand exactly why crops refused to grow. Clifton may have been suggesting that the very earth itself was going against the injustice of slavery and therefore refusing to yield any form of harvest. QWERTYUI Stories concerning slavery is are generally sorrowful tales but Clifton’s story also has a ‘rattle of Hope’ left in the end. Near the end, she describes how nothing on the master’s fields can flourish but then wild berries (presumably mulberry, if the title’s anything to go by) begin to bloom. Through this, the author manages to present a beautiful picture of wild berries sprawling across a field and also passes on a message of hope and possibility of healing the wounds of slavery. QWERTYUI In conclusion, //Mulberry// //Fields// is a well written piece of poetry with the intent of passing on a story about the history of slavery on a particular manor. Written in Clifton's punctuation-free style, the power and force behind her words drive home the consequences of slavery but also the possibility of peace and a better world.

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