tissue by imtiaz dharker Flashcards
(15 cards)
paper as an extended metaphor
used as a metaphor for life: tissue in all it’s meanings - paper, human skin and organs, containing our plans (within life and buildings)
context
apart of dharker’s collection entitled ‘terrorist at my table’ written during a time when her partner was terminally ill - vulnerablility of human life is evident
structure
9 stanzas of 4 lines each (quatrains) and a final stanza of one line
free verse but enjambment is used within stanzas and linking ideas
irregular, arrhythmic structure is a reflection on the disorganised nature of life no matter how we try to impose control
overall language/rhyming
language is simple, mainly monosyllabic words
assonance and consonance is used to give cohesion and rhythm to the composition
‘paper that lets the light shine through, this is what could alter things’
religious connotations of light
ancient religious books are often written in flimsy parchment - evokes imagery of a stained glass window etc
suggests fragility of life
extended metaphor for human soul - light/soul shines through paper, meaning humans memory is more powerful than documents of ourselves which was ‘never meant to last’
‘paper thinned by age or touching’
human skin deteriorates as paper does too
‘the kind you find in well used books, the back of the Koran, where a hand has written in the names and histories’
shift from power of god to power of man
the histories we create are all in context to god
‘who died where and how on which sepia date’
(birth or date of an individual)
sepia is a chemical filter used by early photographers to preserve the image
‘pages smoothed and stroked and turned transparent with attention’
rule of 3
repetition of and and s/t sound (sibilants/fricative)
juxtaposition - although we focus on life it fades as we focus on memory not present
‘if buildings were paper i might feel their drift … fall awa on a shift in the direction of the wind’
society is fragile, civilisation is delicately balanced and can be easily blown away wind - metaphor for political ideology
‘maps too. the sun shines through their borderlines’
life shines through the limitations placed by humanity of border and travel restrictions, humanity is not intended to be like that
‘might fly our lives like paper kites’
similar shows that we value freedom but we remain controlled in our movement
who controls kite - god?
‘an architect could use all this … but let the daylight break through capitals and monoliths’
capitals/monoliths representative of where power in society is
humanity/light can shine through
‘a grand design with living tissue’
connected in smooth enjambment - the grand buildings and the thin tissue that opens the poem
living tissue - flesh and muscle which makes us human, which is needed to make these structures
‘paper smoothed and stroked and thinned to be transparent, turned into your skin’
sibilance - design is thought out
humans are as fragile as paper, but we are the tissue building the word (skin tissue etc) we draw plans (like an architect) and devise our lives with tissue - which can be fragile or powerful
direct 2nd person pronoun directly addresses reader, signifying we are all equal in gods ‘grand design’
final single main breaks arrhythmatic quatrains reflecting how life at the end can be unpredictable and to try and impose order is pointless
