Jeremy Ashton Period 1A People are constantly being disappointed: with their choices, with other peoples actions,

and with hundreds of other things in their lives. Rivus by Richard Tagett, and Crystal Meth under Her Choir Robe by John Repp; are both about the disappointment that a person finds in a certain situation or with another person or thing that they feel committed to. The narrators in each poem have different emotions set-forth by their disappointment. They both face different problems and feel different emotions because of their different situations. The differences between the narrators are what create the poetic circumstances in their lives. In Rivus, based on these lines; as the/ same/ hands I/ crushed to keep/ you from/ death. and the obvious sadness that he expresses throughout the poem, Im assuming that the narrator has recently saved the life of a loved one in some way. He expected to be loved in return; thats why he is disappointed. Even if the line I mentioned doesnt mean that he literally saved that persons life and that he has just worked very hard to keep them healthy and alive, as a parent with its kids, the same feeling of disappointment can be applied. His abstract explanations make it hard to understand his situation in full detail. The narrator in Crystal Meth under Her Choir Robe has a different reaction to his disappointment; he is angered by his situation. He describes his emotions in concrete ways, with a few metaphors thrown in.
Both of these poems are formatted in very different ways, but both have a similar rhythm. Tagett wrote his poem using short stanzas and one to three word long lines. Repp has a single stanza and each line is the length of a mid-sized sentence. The differences in formatting affect the general flow

of words in the poem. Having short lines creates an emphasis on certain words, forcing the reader to focus on the more abstract ideas in the poem, such as fondness and metaphorical floating violins. The long lines make the poem flow as a single thought, or a continuous thought, from the narrator. People think with singularity, but still contain complexity, much like this poem. While Repp uses more direct and realistic descriptions to show the emotion in his poem, Tagett uses surreal and very simple ideas to get the idea across to the reader. While reading Repps poem for the first time it seemed be a little bit more abstract than it actually is, but after a second read-through I noticed that it was actually straight-forward and to the point. His poem resembles the actual thought process of a human; the narrator rambles and often complicates his simple ideas. Rivus is written in a way that emphasizes the abstract ideas within the poem, Crystal Meth under Her Choir Robe is written in a way that balances the concrete and abstract ideas to create a sense of conscious thought. Disappointment is expressed in each poem, and that is basically their only similarity. Both narrators seem to place their blame on a single person instead of themselves, when it is probably their own fault that they feel that way. The thoughts of the narrators create realistic situations that all people can relate to in some way or another.