The Gift Analysis Essays - Aesthetics, Poetic Form, Poetry

The Gift Analysis The poem ?The Gift? by Li-Young Lee is a poem where the author shows the knowledge passed from father to son, which is later put on use. The author does this effectively by using imagery, shift between past and present, and the relationship the poem has with its title. Lee writes a poem with a first person, eye-witness, lyrical voice. This lyrical voice being the son of the man removing the splinter, and as the poem progresses the reader is shifted to the future, where the lyrical voice goes from being a ?seven? (24) year old kid, to having a wife. Li-Young Lee uses a lot of imagery in order to successfully portray what this father is passing on to his son. At the beginning of the poem, while the lyrical voice is being liberated from a metal splinter ?[his] father recited a story? (2), the fact that his father ?recited? a story to him, shows his love for his son. This is because, it is only the loving fathers who actually sit down to read their son/daughter a story, which is what he is doing right now. Therefore, one can already relate the title of the poem, ?The Gift?, to the poem itself, where the father is gifting his son, the sentiment of love. Even though, love is one of the ?gift[s]? talked about throughout the poem, it is not the only one, nor the main one. This is because the main gift shown throughout the poem is the gift of knowledge. This is because one can easily see how, as the poem further develops, the lyrical voice of the poem is being the one with the splinter removed, ?he?d removed the iron silver I thought I?d die from?(4-5), his father saved him from what he thought would be his presumptuous death. Such impression on a kid would certainly push him to learn such a feat. And as the poem progresses, it is the turn for the lyrical voice to remove the splinter, and prove the reader he has learned from his paternal figure ?Watch as I lift the splinter out? (23). The lyrical voice, in contrast to his father, proudly talks about what he has learned, ?Watch as I?, shows how the lyrical voice would like everyone he knew gathered around him seeing what he can do, while his father took a much more humble approach to it, diverging attention from the removal of the splinter to a story he ?recited? to his son. Therefore, one can easily se e how his father has given him the gift of knowledge, and it is demonstrated throughout the poem by the fact that both father and son, know how too carefully and successfully remove splinters. In addition, Li-Young Lee shifts time throughout the poem so that the reader can easily identify the shift from childhood to manhood in the lyrical voice. This is so that one can identify the father?s gift of knowledge in action years later when this ?seven? year old boy is married and finally in need of what his father has passed on to him. There are three shifts in time throughout this poem; it starts off with the lyrical voice being a small kid, precisely seven. ?I can?t remember the tale? (6), it can be easily seen that because his father is still reading tales to him, that he must be a small kid, when in fact, parents stop storytelling their kids when reaching 10-11 years old. But as the poem progresses, the author shifts the time where the poem is situated and now shows this kid as a grown man, where he is removing a splinter from his ?wife?s right hand? (20), and as stated before, demonstrating the gift of knowledge passed on from his father. And further down into the poem, on e can see how the author returns the lyrical voice to when it was seven years old. As if the lyrical voice was wandering through his memories, ?I was seven when my father took my hand like this?, the lyrical voice is now relating the splinter in his wife, with the one his father took off him when he was seven. And this is