The poem, Midnight Office, by Cynthia Cruz, uses sharp contrast between neutral and sorrowful tones to show that the meaning of the poem is, death is meaningless. The specific tones she uses are, abandoned and depressed for the sorrowful end of the poem, and she uses allusive tones and relieved tones to show how the beginning of the poem is neutral
In the first stanza, Cynthia Cruz words her poem in a neutral tone. She uses words like “she is sleeping”, and “the child is not dead” (cruse, midnight office 1). She states this stanza as if she is saying it like it is, or matter of fact which is a neutral tone. Towards the end of the poem, Cruz words her poem in a sorrowful tone. She uses phrases like “praying for the storm to destroy me” and
