I would add links to the actual poems, but I forget how to do it!
A poet when writing may use some devices
Of literary merit, to help with his art.
They are forms of rhetoric, (the meter is off here)
And to study these forms we can start
With irony.
What is it? Well, let me explain
Three main ones there are, to be sure.
One's known as "dramatic," and one is called "verbal",
And "situational" a third, I am sure you concur.
Irony means there's a difference between,
That which is meant and what's actually wrought,
In verbal you say what you really don't mean,
Discordance 'tween utt'rance and thought.
If I say what I say, but I mean something else
You might say I'm sarcastic, of course;
But really this is a rhetorical device:
Verbal irony, through lines of discourse.
With dramatic irony the readers receive,
A wink of the eye from the author,
His character "thinks" something's bound to occur,
But we know the result will be other.
So verily now, I have covered those two,
And now I have come to the last,
On "situational irony" I must pen some words,
If this course I 'm to put in my past.
To Wikipedia, I ventured to check,
What exactly it would have to say,
"A discrepancy," said it -- 'tween expected results
and what actually happened that day.
It's "perverse appropriateness," or so they have written,
And examples they even have given,
And one that is worth a retelling right here,
Is what happened one instance to Reagan.
A bad man named Hinkley took shots at the pres,
But his shots were quite useless and missed,
Except for a bullet that ricocheted of the car,
And struck Mr. Ron in the chest.
Yes, the president rode in a bullet-proof car,
And here irony's really quite clear,
That very same car that was built to protect,
Was the cause of his greatest of fears.
But, oh, I've digressed, I am sorry to say,
For poetry, that is my mission,
And some that we've studied in class at Beit Berl.
Are ironic in their situation.
I'll start out with Zangwill, across the Atlantic,
Who yearned for one far from his heart,
Yet when they were close, things just weren't all that great,
And I'll venture that couple did part.
And what about Cory, that Richard, that dear,
Who seemed to be blessed on this land,
It seems he had all, how ironic, it is,
That he took his own life by his hand.
Simic's Poem, starts out, with all good and all fine;
Aspirations and feelings of freedom,
Yet irony hits, stanza two is a shock,
His reality's filled full of boredom.
Ozymandias, by Shelley, is also a case
Where ironic is the situation,
A king can be strong, and unfailing, but, oh,
The end's death, there is no other option.
And ironic it is for poor Mister Payn,
(I'll give here just one sample more),
That his buttered toast, oh, so delicious and crisp,
Always ends up "good" side on the floor.
So much for examples of what I have learned,
How irony to those did pertain,
And now I will go on to discuss what I can,
Of Hardy's Convergence of the Twain .
The Titanic's situation
Is as ironic as can be
A ship they said would never sink
Lies two leagues six beneath the sea.
"She can't go down," they all assured,
To those passengers, one and all.
Alas, on her maiden voyage
She was downed by an iceberg small.
Three years after that dreadful night,
Hardy wrote these lines in disdain,
Such wealth and human vanity,
But does anything now remain?
In Stanza one, to stanza five
He contrasts fancy items,
That seemed so crucial in their time,
Are now cold, where fish can bite 'em?
The mirrors, jewels, and gilded crafts,
Fiery furnaces once burned red,
Are homes to fish and sea-worms dumb,
A waste in that watery bed.
From stanza six and to the end,
He tells us, oh my! what a chill!
The iceberg crash was not just chance,
But the aim of "Immanent Will."
While mortals vain, designed their pride,
An "epitomous" endeavor,
An iceberg, too, was being formed,
The "Millionaire's Ship's" to sever.
On April fourteenth, nineteen twelve,
Two halves out at sea would be wed,
They thought she was unsinkable,
"Ha ha!" is what Destiny said.
And that, my friend, is situational irony!
References.
http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/hardy/dean1.html
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Irony
