Death

The two poems that I chose to discuss were "Encounter" by Czeslaw Milosz and "Slowly" by Donna Masini. Both of these poems are similar because they both discuss the topic of death. Both of these deaths that occurred had little affect over the author writing about them because they knew very little about the dying object.

In "Encounter", the man that had died was simply an encounter. She did not know him very well. She had just met him, and was just a fling that didn't mean much. In "Slowly", it was just some rabbit that the little boy saw at the zoo. It wasn't like a pet or anything. He saw him for a split second and then he was gone. Both of these poems illustrate how something that can make you so happy and then goes downhill and makes you sad. You never know a good thing till it's gone. Another similarity between these two is that there is a rabbit that dies in both poems. And in both poems the rabbit is there and then is quickly gone.

At the end of "Slowly", the author says "How slow the body is to realize. You are never coming back." I think this statement applies as well to "Encounter" where author is reminiscing and is just now realizing that she is growing older and many of the people from her past are passing away. She didn't think about that before. Because when you're young, the thought of your friends dying doesn't even cross your mind. But now she is coming to terms with reality.