In the poem “Snapping beans” by Lisa parker, the speaker tells of her experience while arguing her thoughts of whether to reveal about her new life in college to her grandmother or not. The young lady is home to her grandmother from college for the weekend. She is busy snapping beans with her grandmother when she asked how school is going. She replies that it is fine though she was aware that her grandmother would never approve the new friends in college or what they talked about.  She wanted to tell her grandmother everything but was afraid of her reaction. In her poem, “snapping beans” Lisa parker uses a conversational tone, imagery, similes, personification, alliteration to elaborate on the theme that to maintain order in life, one has to ignore his/her feelings sometimes.

In this poem, the first element that Lisa Parkers uses is a conversational tone. The speakers tone in the poem is conversational yet restrained and wistful. The speaker is aware that she is not as close to her grandmother as she used to be before she left for college. The speaker says, “We didn’t speak until the sun overcame the feathered tips of the cornfield“ (Meyer, 2000). The speaker and her grandmother were just sitting for most part of the day without speaking. This shows that the relationship between them was not good.  She however longs to share her experiences with her grandmother but she restrains herself in order to preserve the closeness with her grandmother. The speaker says, “I wanted to tell her about my classes, the revelations by book and lecture” (Meyer, 2000). Many of the things she experienced in college are against the teachings she received at home as a child. She is thus aware that her grandmother would not approve of them and she decided to restrain herself.  This may also mean that south traditions are different from those of the north and the speaker is ware that her grandmother might not approve the indisputable subjects in college.

A second literally element that Lisa Parker uses in this poem is imagery.  Imagery helps the reader to visualize a moment or a thing. It uses a figurative language.  The speaker to describe the scenery of the poem uses imagery.  First, the speaker uses imagery to show how her grandmother was staring at her. The speaker says, “I could feel the soft gray of her stare against the side of my face” (Meyer, 2000). The speaker and her grandmother have are both quiet, but the grandmother is starring at the speaker. Certainly, they are facing each other. There is a moment of tension. The grandmother is waiting for the speaker to tell her about school but the speaker is restraining from telling her. While describing how the leave falls into the porch front, the speaker also uses imagery, inform of her grandmother s statement, “it’s funny how things blow loose like that” (Meyer, 2000). It helps the reader visualize how the leave fell. In the poem, there is little dialogue between the speaker and the grandmother. Imagery feels in nicely for the lack of conversation between the two. By visualizing the whole situation, the reader is able to picture what the speaker is trying to conveying in the conversation with her grandmother.

The third element that Lisa Parker used in this poem is simile. Similes compare two attributes or things that are in no way similar. They are used to emphasize a description. Similes often use the words “like” or “as”. They allow the reader to understand what the writer really meant. There are several examples of simile in the” snapping beans”. The first is that the speaker’s college experience. The speaker compares her revelations through reading books and attending lectures to a shout of faith.  The revelations about different things learnt in school are real. They wrote poetry about sex, alcoholism, and Buddha. These were against the teachings she received back home. Her experience was real just as shouting ones faith is real. The speaker also says, “Potent as a swig of strychnine” (Meyer, 2000). This is to elaborate on the influence her education in college has on her.

A fourth element Lisa Parker uses in this poem is alliteration. Throughout the poem, alliteration is very prominent. The first example of alliteration is “snapped beans into the silver bowl that sat on the splintering glass” (Meyer, 2000). This creates the effect of conflict. The glass is splintering but the bowl is sitting on it. There is a conflict between the bowl and the glass. This portrays the conflict between the speaker and her grandmother. It creates the essence of conflict that exist between the speakers new experiences of the world and her grandmothers understanding of the world. Lisa Parker uses conflicting words such as faith and Jesus as compared to sex, alcoholism, Buddha and noserings to bring out the conflict between the speakers teachings when she was a child and her new experiences in college.

Lastly, Lisa Parker theme in this poem was that to maintain order in life, one has to ignore his/her feelings sometimes.  The speaker is worried about telling her grandmother about her new experiences in college.  Her childhood teachings and her new experiences are two different worlds. She longs to tell her grandmother about her new experiences but she is aware that her grandmother will not approve of her new experiences. Her grandmother is religious and beliefs in Jesus as opposed to the speakers learning of Buddha. Her morals as a Christian are against sex, alcoholism, and Buddha. The speaker on the other hand has experienced other morals in the north. They are writing poetry about sex, alcoholism and Buddha in school (Meyer, 2000) . This is against her grandmothers teachings. Naturally, her grandmother would never approve these teachings. She would be angry or sad about the speaker’s new experiences. To avoid this, the speaker decided to keep quiet about her new experiences. She opts to say that school is fine. The speaker’s guilt of not revealing her feelings was tearing her apart but she still chooses to stay calm. Maybe the guilt of having revealed her feelings would have been even worse.

Reference

Meyer, M. (2000). The compact Bedford introduction to literature. Boston, MA: Bedford/St. Martin’s.

 
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