“Robin Redbreast” by Stanley Kunitz, is a reflective poem in which Kunitz finds a bird that has fallen out of a tree and tries to rescue it by sending it back in the air. Kunitz realizes while holding it in the air that the bird was shot, incapable of flying again. With this poem Kunitz is providing the reader with his impression on cruelty and death. The poem starts with a description of the bird: “all the color washed from him”. This foreshadows the ending of the poem with the speaker’s realization of the death of the bird. In line 6 Kunitz introduces a biblical allusion to the Garden of Eden in order to emphasize this theme of cruelty. Adam and Eve forever plagued the world with sin by eating the forbidden fruit, instilling sin in every person. This act is the cruelest of them all for their mistake has forever negatively impacted the world. With lines 11 and 15 Kunitz reintroduces this idea of cruelty by commenting on the cruelty of society. Kunitz compares society to the jays who ridiculed and tormented the robin out of the tree.
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The Garden of Eden was where Adam and Eve lived; the creation of life took place in that location. The personification of fear in line 25, “fear clutched my hand” emphasizes the shift from a sort of heroic mood to a mood of darkness. The personification perfectly helps the mood shift so that the ending will be more effective. In lines 26 through 31 Kunitz describes the bird with a hole right through its head. The reader realizes that the bird was dead the entire time. I felt as though the entire beginning of the poem was a lie. I felt betrayed by Kunitz for getting my hopes up for this bird. This feeling of betrayal created by the poem was necessary to bring out both the themes of cruelty and death. The act of betrayal is cruel on its own, but betrayal and cruelty usually lead to
The Garden of Eden was where Adam and Eve lived; the creation of life took place in that location. The personification of fear in line 25, “fear clutched my hand” emphasizes the shift from a sort of heroic mood to a mood of darkness. The personification perfectly helps the mood shift so that the ending will be more effective. In lines 26 through 31 Kunitz describes the bird with a hole right through its head. The reader realizes that the bird was dead the entire time. I felt as though the entire beginning of the poem was a lie. I felt betrayed by Kunitz for getting my hopes up for this bird. This feeling of betrayal created by the poem was necessary to bring out both the themes of cruelty and death. The act of betrayal is cruel on its own, but betrayal and cruelty usually lead to