The hopeless world... in "When I have fears that I may cease to be"

The following post will touch upon the topics presented in the poem when I have fears that I may cease to be of Coleridge.

The first theme existing in the poem is the transient and superfluous of life. Here the author is expressing his disappointment with the world he is living. He knows he will not be remembered, that all his existence will not be more than a remembrance is someone’s mind. He will not endure and the wind will take his last breath and all his life without anyone who remembers him. That is why he has fears the he ceases to be who he is now.

Another aspect within this poem is the pity he feels about not being remembered by his lover. He will not be able to look his lover’s face again and she will not remember him because his life is fading like sunlight in the twilight hour.

One last element of this poem is the author’s awareness of the human feelings fragility when death comes. He know that when he dies, everything in what he believed, he loved, he thought will vanish with his last heart beat. That is why he witnesses when love and fame in the nothingness sink.

Nature and Poetry in Kubla Khan

“It is essential to poetry that it should be simple, and appeal to the elements and primary laws of nature; that it should be sensuous, and by its imagery elicit truth at a flash; that it should be impassioned, and be able to move our feelings and awaken affection”.

The following entry will be devoted to the discussion of Coleridge’s Poem Kubla Khan and the relation between this poem and the quote presented above, as a way of stating the similarities that are between these two elements.

When we refer to the term simple, it is not intended to minimize poetry to its basic structure but, it implies to the simplicity of nature, the simplicity of the world that surround us, where the hand of the man has not arrived yet. That is what is referring the term simple here.

A second aspect of the quote is that it say that poetry should be sensuous, which it might mean that it should be connected to the inner part of the human being, like feelings for example. There is no better way to know a person in depth but knowing his/her feelings. To be aware of the deepest thoughts and sensations of a person means to be in touch with his/her soul.

A third aspect of the quote presented above is when it refers to the imagery as a path to awake the affection. Through the beauty of the imagery included in a poem, through its power of conviction with its deep words, we can travel to the inner part of our soul, where affection lives inside of our heart.

Blake and the Bible...

After reading “the little black boy” by William Blake it is pretty obvious the existing connection between Blake’s words and some passages of the bible. This is exemplified in the very third line of the poem, where the word “angel” is quoted. Much is the closer relation between angels and the bible; in fact, these beings were the ones that appear many times in some passages of it.

Another connection within the Blake’s poem and the Bible is the verse where God is named as the one who will have the two boys, the black and the white, sit in His knees when everything else has passed, when the end of the days has come, at last. Here, Blake calls directly to the belief that, even though on the earth there are differences among people, in the Kingdom there will not be any difference among people, everybody will be the same in front of God.