The Poe-t.

Edgar Allen Poe is a staple in American Gothic writing, specifically in the masterful art of his poetry. After reading in class two excerpts and analyzing many more, you get to see the deeper meanings of Poe and his writings. Darkness. Despair. The poems of Edgar are a giant part of opening the eyes of his readers. He uses every single sense and more to get across the true themes of his writing. Loneliness is hell. Love is materialistic. Passion is savior to lost souls. Without Poe's poetry, American writing would be at a loss, and his readers would not have the outlook on life they have today.

Poe had loss in his family early on, and throughout life took all twelve rounds battering him into a metaphorical lump of loneliness. Many readers may attribute this to his "dark" sense of writing. Never does Poe set his stories in the dandelion fields or the children's playground. But this is not the reason. Poe used previous styles, long forgotten, and resurrected them to give readers a new type of story. No longer were the good guys beating the bad guys. No longer was the "happily ever after" tales of which we've learned to hate. It was a new sense of writing that did its job better than ever before; teach a lesson, get a metaphor across while keeping the reader entertained and on the edge of their seat.

This is Poe's greatest talent. The Raven, for example, classified as the greatest poem of all time, was a roller coaster ride that not only was the horror, but was also able to throw in the intricacies of a true story within every line. Poe was able to transform the face of poetry from happy meadows to dark castles, while keeping the influential principles within his story the same. That is the true beauty of the poet.

An American

An American isn’t defined as someone who can live in the Great United States. It’s more than that. An American has character, a definition embedded within all of us because of what our country is made of. We can be farmers, using the fertile lands that we are established on to embrace an opportunity. We can build the highest of towers and claim the skies our own. An American can be free, and American can be brave, but an American has to call the country where they have lived all their life “home”. An American should be “home”. As the dilemma is presented, we introduce ourselves from other nationalities. “I’m Italian”. No you aren’t, you’re an American, as a real Italian would say. We aren’t ever aware of this flaw because of the perpetuation of the idea that we are a melting pot; that we come from another land. We never have had the chance to call ourselves what we actually are because we are masked by our ancestor’s ambitions. We hide behind the houses that we built long ago in foreign lands, when we need to embrace the actuality of where we are from. The foundations of my home, literal and physical, reside in the United States of America. Someone who comes from another, but acknowledges the present is an American. Americans are here, we are where we call home.