Hawk Roosting And The Eagel, Egotism And Ecosystems

4 Pages 935 Words

“Hawk Roosting” and “The Eagle”
Egotism and Ecosystems
The poems, “The Eagle” by Alfred Lord Tennyson and “Hawk Roosting” by Ted Hughes, have virtually the same basic image. Both poems describe the magnificence of birds and their need to stalk and kill prey. Yet, the poems have different themes and have dissimilar results. In this essay I will compare and contrast the poems voice, tone, message, and pattern.
The poems have different voices. The poem “Hawk Roosting” is the hawk describing himself, “I sit in the top of the wood, my eyes closed.” In describing himself and his actions, the hawk sets a tone of arrogance and supremacy. He is highly taken by his own creation and his abilities. This is unlike the poem “The Eagle” where someone else is describing the eagle and his actions. In the first line the speaker says “He clasps the crag with crooked hands”. This shows that the eagle is not talking about himself.
Although the event taking place is both poems are similar (hunting), the tones are different. Whereas one poem demonstrates as obsessive opinion of one’s self, the other states the facts. In the “Hawk Roosting” the statement “I kill where I please because it is all mine” demonstrates this obsessive ownership and opinion of this creature. In addition, the hawk enjoys having the power over other creatures and the craving for more of it. “He watches from his mountain walls” stated in “The Eagle” demonstrates the facts of what an eagle does to hunt and survive. The tone in the “Hawk Roosting” uses statements and single words that although uplift the Hawks view of him, limit all others. In The Eagle, the tone captures the bird’s great ability, yet keeps some boundaries and reflects more of nature’s way, rather than a pontification of one’s self and power as heard in “Hawk Roosting”.
The poems both convey the same basic message that birds must kill and ...