Hey,
I have to do a Poetry report and i need help on it. I have to find 5 poems that i like. Then i ahve to do a 2 paragraph illistration on each of them i need help on what The Secret Heart says like i need help interperting it! If you have any help please email me or reply. Thank you so much.

Do you have a copy of the poem? There are several poems with that name.

Les

Thanks for the e-mail. Here you go:


The Secret Heart
By: Robert P. Tristram Coffin

Across the years he could recall
His father one way best of all.

In the stillest hour of night
The boy awakened to a light.

Half in dreams, he was his sire
With his great hands full of fire.

The man had struck a match to see
If his son slept peacefully.

He held his palms each side the spark
His love had kindled in the dark.

His two hands were curved apart
In the semblance of a heart.

He wore, it seemed to his small son,
A bare heart on his hidden one,

A heart that gave out such a glow
No son awake could bare to know.

It showed a look upon a face
Too tender for the day to trace.

One instant, it lit all about,
And then the secret heart went out.

But shone long enough for one
To know that hands held up the sun.


There are several ways one can look at this poem. The boy is comparing his father's lighted match to:

1. The sun (which gives life)
2. A fire (which keeps out the dark)
3. A heart (which shows he cares)

In essence the poet is saying that by lighting the match to check on the boy at night, the father is showing that he is caring, all powerful in the eyes of the boy, and a model of bravery by facing the darkness. All things a young boy might imagine their father to be.

The last line indicates that when his father is gone, his earliest recollections of the "match" bearer were indeed true. His father was all those things the
boy had imagined him to be.


Les

... i need a paraphrased version of the secret heart. the one by robert p. tristram coffin please. please email it to me to the above address by tomorrow.

Danielle

Why can't I just charter a jet, rent a car, and bring it to you personally?

On a silver platter, one hopes.

pam