Howl (analysis) MB

From the very first sentence of this poem the reader figures out it will contain controversial metaphors and relate to touchy subject matters. The poem itself describes post WWII New York City and it’s impoverished world, over run with alcohol and drugs. However, because the author lived life as a bet nick, he writes the opposite of what a person living in the 1950’s would say about the subjects presented here. He hates the time period he is living and thinks America is throwing away all of it’s greatest minds and philosophers out on the street because they follow a “unconditional” and radical way of thinking. This is exemplified when he writes “who bared their brains to Heaven under the El and saw Mohammedan angels staggering on tenement roofs illuminated, who passed through universities with radiant cool eyes hallucinating Arkansas and Blake-light tragedy among the scholars of war.“ Meaning universities, at the time, are just turning out weapon produces. It is sentences like these that turned away and anger by such radical thinking. Situations like these are the bases for censorship; people automatically choosing weather or not something are good or bad and forcing it on others in order to establish truth to their oppion. To me this is a piece of work is not encouraging it’s readers to do drugs, unconventional sex, and alcohol. Rather a way of introducing the idea that the world is changing (for good or ill) and we, as people, should be changing it ourselves instead of it changing us. (Letting groups or parties decide) The line where he says “who let themselves be fucked in the ass by saintly motorcyclists, and screamed with joy” caused this poem to go on trail. I interpret it as the most “honest part of the poem.” It almost says if you react to this sentence you understand America is not free. Nothing deserves to be banned, poems like this must be looked at with an open mind.