Around and Around

Around and Around

The poem, “Loss and Gain” by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow and “The Phoenix Again” by May Sarton discuss how emotions exist in a circular cycle that has no beginning or end, a flow that continually shifts between grief and prosperity, loss and gain.

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow depicts this disparity in a metaphorical manner as the changing of tides, and how the lowest of tides eventually becomes the highest crest in the ocean. His use of increasing syllables in each stanza emphasizes the existence of a forward motion requiring a regression in order to advance. In addition to the increase of syllables within each stanza, Longfellow increases the syllable count of the last two lines of each stanza to clearly illustrate that the forward motion compensates for the initial regression. The syntax is not the sole contributor to the overall message of the poem. The use of personal pronouns makes the poem unique to each reader and adds to the idea that loss and gain are relative to individuals. In fact, the third stanza, “but who shall dare to measure loss and gain” clearly shows Longfellow’s belief that it is impossible and somewhat audacious to put a number on such an intangible concept.

In the poem, “The Phoenix Again”, May Sarton like Longfellow centers her work around the cyclical state of emotions. She however, uses a mythological creature rather than a fundamental element of nature to convey this message. It is common knowledge that a phoenix is a bird that upon death bursts into flames, and is then reborn from its ashes. Though a phoenix can never truly die, it can experience youth and age, pain and pleasure, loss and gain. May Sarton’s assertion that death and rebirth are “nature’s laws” expands the idea that the natural order would be perverted if the cycle was broken. Obviously the survival of nature as well as those who dwell within it, is dependent on the circular flow