Poetry Reading Response

Comparing two poems; “Time” by Allen Curnow and “First Love” by John Clare

Rolla Tyas Amalia- Grade 11

Something I learned while reading these two poems is how simple things

like time and love can affect people’s life and turn it complicated. This idea can

be seen in the poem “Time” by Allen Curnow. The poem talks about how time can

affects and control everything in the world, including people’s life. An example of

this is when the time being stated as the Beginning and the End. It says in the

poem, “I am, you have heard it, the Beginning and the End”. This means that time

started everything and by time everything has it ends. Time lets living things live,

but it also kills them. Time creates any object, but it also destroys it. By time

everything has a beginning and an end. Through time, everything can be more

complicated when we’re racing with time. It’s not the time that is changing,

because Curnow keeps explaining in the poem that time has no beginning nor

ending, but it’s just there guiding us through life. The second poem, “First Love”

by John Clare is about how someone had fallen in love but it’s been unrequited,

and it affects their life. An example of that is when it says, “And when she looked,

what could I ail? My life and all seemed turned to clay”. This means that he can’t

resist her and his feeling when he was fallen in love with her. It also says, “My

heart has left its dwelling-place and can return no more”. This means that his

love had fallen apart but he couldn’t fix it. It indicates the loss of innocence in the

sense that his passions and desires. This shows us how love could make

someone’s life become complicated. Life isn’t a simple thing that can be

described easily. There are many things that could affect our ways of living. Time

and love could be the main things that affect people’s life. With love this world

can make peace and with love also world can be destroy. Time is important,

because everything is changing through the flowing of time. It always there

guiding us through life.