A Prayer for the Turkey

I give thanks to you, delicious Turkey,
For You fill tummy
With Your yummy meat.

Mixing you with my mashed potatoes
is all I ask to be on my table.
No gravy to spoil the natural taste.

While all my family thanks each other,
I thank you, my wonderful turkey:
You make Thanksgiving great.

Those winter Sundays by Robert Hayden

Those winter Sundays is a very visual poem. I can see the narrator’s father waking up by himself, and starting the house fire to warm the rest of the house. According to the narrator, no one in the house ever thanked him:  it was the norm, he would always start the fire. Just as we don’t think to thank our parents for the simple things they do for their children.

Because the Robert Hayden wrote the poem, it insinuates that he feels remorse for not thanking his father for always starting the fire. Maybe he is the one who needs the start the fire in his home now and no one in his home thanks him for the simple tasks he does. 

A Study of Reading Habits by Philip Larkin

A Study of Reading Habits takes the reader into the reading life of the narrator. He used to love reading:   it took him into a world where he could be what he wasn’t in real life. “To know I could still keep cool, and deal out the old right hook to dirty dogs twice my size. “ This idea reminds me of the “Rugrats”, when the babies go to the library for the first time and find themselves in multiple worlds through different books. Maybe I like this poem so much because I wish that books could take me to another world, an exciting one.

In the end, the narrator admits he does not read much anymore. Based on his explanation, it seems as though he has read many books with the same theme:  “The dude who lets the girl down before the hero arrives, the chap who’s yellow and keeps the store, seem far too familiar.” Books no longer take him into a new world – only to an old one that he doesn’t wish to continue visiting.