Metaphors In Old Ladies Home

When thinking of the fragility of life, I recall a quote from a poem I once memorized, written by Sylvia Plath, entitled “Old Ladies’ Home.” It includes the line, “Frail as antique earthenware,” referring to the fragility of the elderly in a nursing home. I have spent the past year and a half surrounded by children whose very existence personifies the term ‘frail’ and I have often found myself reflecting back to the profoundness of this poem. Now, having read for a second time, John Jeremiah Sullivan’s “Feet in Smoke” and Brian Doyle’s “Joyas Voladores”, the authors’ perspectives on just how fragile life can be has taken on an even deeper meaning than my original take on each essay. Each author reflects upon the fragility of life, but go about …show more content…
Upon reading the first few paragraphs of Doyle’s “Joyas Voladores” (flying jewels, aka: hummingbirds) one would think the author’s interest was one of a scientist and/or naturalist. He begins by describing the size of the heart of a hummingbird and comparing it to that of a tortoise, using metaphors to stir the mind of the reader, as if to encourage us to explore the connection between how we live our lives and how we love. He goes on to list the mega-long, scientific, names of various types of hummingbirds such as “rainbow-bearded thornbills and glittering-bellied emeralds,” and “violet-tailed sylphs and violet-capped woodnymphs.” (Doyle. ) -- Note the hyperbole in the names! – He speaks of the brevity of their life – they seldom live to be two years -- and of the tragic way in which they die. The more they slow down, the more quickly they die. Doyle writes, “The price of their ambition is a life closer to death.” “It’s expensive to fly. You burn out. You fry the machine. You melt the engine. Every creature on earth has approximately two billion heartbeats to spend in a lifetime. You can spend them slowly, like a tortoise, and live to be two hundred years old, or you can spend them fast, like a hummingbird, and live to be two years old.” (Doyle. ) Of course, the author is speaking of more than just hummingbirds. He is comparing the heart …show more content…
Each remind us that life is meant to be lived and it is the reader’s choice as to how quickly, or slowly, they spend their life. Sullivan uses the power of a narrative essay by detailing a real life experience. He has the reader believing they are in the hospital room with him, experiencing his tears, his laughter; feeling his determination to never leave his brother and to accept whatever the outcome of his brother’s condition will be. Doyle, ever so poetically, has the reader almost crying at the thought of a hummingbird sleeping, “But when they rest they come close to death: on frigid nights, or when they are starving, they retreat into torpor, their metabolic rate slowing to a fifteenth of their normal sleep rate, their hearts sludging nearly to a halt, barely beating, and if they are not soon warmed, if they do not soon find that which is sweet, their hearts grow cold, and they cease to be.” (Doyle ) Both authors’ use of descriptive language is what was most engaging for this reader, each eloquently using metaphors, hyperbole, simile and symbolism to get their message across to the reader. While their style of engaging the reader was different -- Doyle, ever so serious and Sullivan, ever so humorous -- both were equally effective due their ability to remind us of circumstances

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