"a song in the front yard" and "Beverly Hills, Chicago," Gwendolyn Brooks
Author: Gwendolyn Brooks
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a song in the front yard
I’ve stayed in the front yard all my life.
I want a peek at the back
Where it’s rough and untended and hungry weed grows.
A girl gets sick of a rose.
She really wants to see whatever’s in the back yard.
The mood of the poem was very Tense and concerning.I say this because throughout the story the daughter was feeling frustrated because she couldn’t live her life like the other kids.
The artist of this poem writes “stayed in the front all my life” which makes me believe they have lived a sheltered lifestyle. The writing “I want a peek at the back” gives me the idea they desire a different lifestyle full of adventure.
how does it feel to only see the front yard? what made he or she not be able to see the back?
Why would the speaker want to go to the back? Why does the speaker want to be where it’s rough and untended?
Their rhyme makes the language sound more beautiful and thoughtfully-composed, like music. Also makes it easier to remember. And this rhyme highlights the difference between the front yard and the backyard — between the weeds and the roses.
I want to go in the back yard now
And maybe down the alley,
To where the charity children play.
I want a good time today.
She wants freedom and space form her old life. She feels the need to go out and Explorer,meet other kids and have fun.
The rhythm of the poem made me feel deep sorrow for the character. The words the person used in the poem made me visualize what was it like for her.
I think what the girl meant is that she just wants to have a peaceful time even though its sad that she said down the alley bc i wonder what she means by down the alley. Its strange but i picture happy children down the alley i guess, just playing with each other n having a good time.
They do some wonderful things.
They have some wonderful fun.
My mother sneers, but I say it’s fine
How they don’t have to go in at quarter to nine.
My mother, she tells me that Johnnie Mae
Will grow up to be a bad woman.
That George’ll be taken to Jail soon or late
(On account of last winter he sold our back gate).
She wants to meet other kids and have fun but her other doesn’t allow her she thinks everyone else kids is Bad. The mother is overprotective to where she doesn’t even allow her kid to talk to other kids.
The connote of the poem was Deep. I say this because the writer use specific words to make you visualize what she or he wants you to see.
The writer says the mother sneers ask they speak of hanging out with the other children. I believe the mother could have been judgmental and sheltering which made the writer desire to live a more lively life.
I believe the writer wanted to bring tension amongst them and their mother. They did this by the difference of opinions and how the child wanted to be the exact thing the mother disliked.
But I say it’s fine.
Honest, I do.
And I’d like to be a bad woman, too,
And wear the brave stockings of night-black lace
And strut down the streets with paint on my face.
her mother raised her in a different way other children were raised and she see other children doing things her mother doest allowed her to do
The writer has a very different opinion then their mother. The writer says “I’d like to be a bad woman, too” They seem to enjoy having a more adventure filled life then the judgmental thoughts of others.
Gwendolyn Brooks, “a song in the front yard” from Selected Poems. Copyright © 1963 by Gwendolyn Brooks. Reprinted with the permission of the Estate of Gwendolyn Brooks.
Source: Selected Poems (1963)
Beverly Hills, Chicago
(“and the people live till they have white hair”)
E.
M.
Price
The dry brown coughing beneath their feet,
(Only for a while, for the handyman is on his way)
These people walk their golden gardens.
We say ourselves fortunate to be driving by today.
That we may look at them, in their gardens where
The summer ripeness rots.
But not raggedly.
Even the leaves fall down in lovelier patterns here.
And the refuse, the refuse is a neat brilliancy.
When they flow sweetly into their houses
With softness and slowness touched by that everlasting gold,
We know what they go to.
To tea.
But that does not mean
They will throw some little black dots into some water and add sugar and the juice of the cheapest lemons that are sold,
While downstairs that woman’s vague phonograph bleats, “Knock me a kiss.”
And the living all to be made again in the sweatingest physical manner
Tomorrow.
.
.
.
Not that anybody is saying that these people have no trouble.
Merely that it is trouble with a gold-flecked beautiful banner.
Nobody is saying that these people do not ultimately cease to be.
And
Sometimes their passings are even more painful than ours.
It is just that so often they live till their hair is white.
They make excellent corpses, among the expensive flowers.
.
.
.
Nobody is furious.
Nobody hates these people.
At least, nobody driving by in this car.
It is only natural, however, that it should occur to us
How much more fortunate they are than we are.
It is only natural that we should look and look
At their wood and brick and stone
And think, while a breath of pine blows,
How different these are from our own.
We do not want them to have less.
But it is only natural that we should think we have not enough.
We drive on, we drive on.
When we speak to each other our voices are a little gruff.
Selected Poems (Harper & Row, 1963)
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She tired of being a good girl. She wants to grow up and be able to wear sexy clothes and a beautiful makeup.
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