"Dream Song 14" by John Berryman

This will be a critical response to John Berryman's Poem.

This is a unique poem thats subtle organization lends to the writers tone of overall dissatisfaction with his life. More so, the speaker of the poem rejects the flashy way of life that has become a natural way of living for the majority of the population and instead chooses to alienate himself from society by pointing out all of its shortcomings. The person that is most representative of this way of thinking is the speakers mother, who says that her son "has no inner resources." The poet seems to find life boring, with that fact even spreading over to his environmental surroundings such as the "tranquil hills. Another aspect of this poem that caught my eye was the rhyme scheme. The poem is composed of three stanzas and uses alternating alternating long and short lines in the pattern: A, A, B, A, A, B. By creating the sonnet in such a short amount of space, Berryman really grabs for the emotional intensity of the subject with his cutting verbs and sharp adjectives. In many ways, this poem is Berryman's opinion on those who live an overexamined life, and is a telling piece of work that makes sense of his suicide.