Have some one ever forced you to read a poem? Don’t you hate reading them because they confuse you and don’t get to the point? But you got lucky and had the chose to choose one? You probably would look for something short and sweet! Well that’s what I did! Amiri Baraka was right on time with her poem SOS. That’s one of the reasons why I love this poem it’s short the other reasons include the facts that SOS repeats constantly through the whole poem saying the same phrases over and over again and connects to historical contents to people like Malcon X, Marin Luther King JR. and Barak Obama.
I love this poem because it’s short. That’s what really caught my attention when I came across this poem. SOS contains a total of 43 words. Amiri didn’t use big words. For example, “whenever” it doesn’t have many letters. Only seven lines long complete the whole poem.
Further more this poem repeats phrases. But with it’s own style and rhythm. It still flowed! Constantly saying “black people,” from the first to the last line, it left a powerful message that African American leaders used.
Finally this poem relates to historical content. “Calling all black people…come on in,” it stated. Martin Luther King Jr. did things in that nature gathering together women, men and children not only blacks but whites also through the civil rights movement to get equity. Influencing them to fight with their hearts. On the other hand Malcon X fought for the rights of black people also, but by any means necessary. Oh and how could I forget Barak Obama. He encouraged all black to get registered if already wasn’t and vote for him ofcourse! Obama won the presidency election and became the first African American president of the United States.
The next time you look for a poem to read make sure you look for the length of it, see how many lines, words and or even see if it’s repetitive. If so, look for the repeating phases. See how many times it repeats. Skim through the poem and see if it relates to historical content. If so it’s good! If you ever come across a poem that does have none of thoughs qualities beware don’t read it!!
