Captivity Explored in a Free-Verse Poem and a Sonnet

A former captive’s narrative of his or her captivity often captivates a large audience. Readers and listeners are always engrossed when perusing a text or listening to an ex-captive’s narration of his or her time in captivity. Such narratives always involve stories of misery, suffering, and despair that attract the attention and sympathy of the audience. I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That by Xu Lizhi and The Caged Skylark by Gerard Manley Hopkins are poems that differ in genre and structure, but both engage with the theme of captivity through the use of literary devices in both shared and distinct ways.

I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That and The Caged Skylark differ in how they are structured. In conveying the message of his poem, I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That, Xu Lizhi utilizes a free-verse style. The absence of rhythm and rhyme schemes demonstrates the fact that the poem does not adhere to a fixed structure or form, hence the style free verse. As well, the entire poem is written in only one stanza. In contrast, Gerard Manley Hopkins’ The Caged Skylark is a poem that follows the form of a Petrarchan sonnet. This is evident in how the fourteen-line poem is divided into two stanzas, an octave—the first eight lines—and a sestet—the last six lines, and how it follows a rhyme scheme of ABBA-ABBA-CCD-CCD, with lines 1, 4, 5, and 8 ending with the words “cage,” “age,” “stage,” and “rage,” and lines 2, 3, 6, and 7 with “dwells,” “fells,” “spells,” and “cells,” respectively. As for the sestet, lines 9, 10, 12, and 13 end with the words “rest,” “nest,” “best,” and “distressed,” and lines 11 and 14 with “prison” and “risen,” respectively. Furthermore, The Caged Skylark contains a volta, which is characteristic of sonnets. This turn or shift of thought in the poem occurs between the octave and the sestet. The volta is employed to demonstrate a shift from the idea of captivity and misery that dominates in the first eight lines to a mood of optimism that is sensed by the readers in the last six lines of the poem.

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The two poems, I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That and The Caged Skylark, both revolve around the theme of captivity. In Xu’s poem, the speaker, who works under inhumane conditions in a factory, reflects on how “they’ve trained [him] to become docile” (line 5). His resentment at being treated like a captive is denoted by the word “docile.” By using this particular word, the speaker indicates that there is a captor whom he needs to submit himself to and that his inherent rights and freedoms as a human being is denied. In addition, he speaks of his experience “by the assembly line,” where he “stood straight like iron, hands like flight” (Xu 15). This line also strongly demonstrates the idea of captivity in the poem, with the “assembly line” symbolizing the place where he is being held captive. Through his description of himself as an “iron” standing “straight,” the speaker illustrates his confinement or his loss of freedom to move freely. Similarly, Hopkins’ The Caged Skylark engages with the theme of captivity. This idea of confinement arises in the beginning of the poem, as the narrator speaks of a “dare-gale skylark scant[ing] in a dull cage” (Hopkins 1). As well, it dominates the octave, as the speaker describes the skylark “drooping deadly sometimes in [its] cells / or wring[ing] [its] barriers in bursts of fear or rage” (Hopkins 7-8). As a bird, the “skylark” is meant to take flight; however, the poem opens with the “skylark” being trapped in a “cage,” denoting that the “skylark” is being held captive. The bird’s confinement is affirmed later in the poem when the speaker describes its actions in the cell—“drooping deadly” and “wring[ing] [its] barriers;” these actions indicate the bird’s despair for its loss of freedom to soar. However, unlike Xu’s I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That, Hopkins’ The Caged Skylark contains a volta that marks a shift from the theme of captivity in the octave to the theme of freedom in the sestet. This is evident when the narrator speaks of the skylark’s “own nest, wild nest,” which is “no prison” (Hopkins 11). The words “own” and “wild” are in stark contrast to the description of the bird’s condition in the octave; in the last six lines of the poem, these words foster optimism that the skylark will eventually attain freedom. On the other hand, the poem I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That starts and ends with the theme of captivity. Until the end, the speaker is in a state of misery as evidenced by his closing remarks, “How many days, how many nights / Did I – just like that – standing fall asleep?” (Xu 16-17).

The use of literary devices is essential in the development of the theme. A number of literary devices are shared by the two poems, with caesura being one. In both poems, a pause within certain lines is created. In I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That, the caesura, which is indicated by a dash, is utilized in the last line when the speaker says, “Did I – just like that – standing fall asleep?” (Xu 17). The pause within the line reinforces the miserable tone of the poem. As the closing statement and final reflection of the speaker, the last line should express the overall mood and tone of the poem, and the use of caesura allows for the achievement of this purpose. Similarly, in The Caged Skylark, a caesura is used in line 13, “But uncumbered: meadow-down is not distressed” (Hopkins). The caesura is used to emphasize the word “uncumbered” and to create a pause, thereby allowing the reader to have a full sense of the phrase that follows the caesura, which is indicated by a colon. Furthermore, the use of certain literary devices also distinguishes one poem from the other. In Xu’s poem, one of its distinctive literary devices is simile. Xu utilizes simile in line 15 when he describes the speaker standing “straight like iron, hands like flight” while working in the “assembly line.” The use of simile further develops the miserable tone and reinforces the theme of captivity. The comparison of the speaker to an “iron” illustrates his confinement to a single area and his loss of ability to act freely and move without constraints. Hopkins’ The Caged Skylark employs contrast as one of its distinctive literary devices. It is used in the first two lines of the poem, “As a dare-gale skylark scanted in a dull cage, / Man’s mounting-spirit in his bone-house, mean house, dwells –” (Hopkins 1-2). The speaker’s description of the skylark as “dare-gale” signifies that it is a bird that dares to soar despite very strong winds; however, the latter description of the skylark as a bird that is confined in a “dull cage” contrasts with this idea. Similarly, in the second line, the narrator speaks of a “Man’s mounting-spirit,” but indicates that this spirit is confined in “his bone-house, mean house,” and thus he is unable to mount, ascend, or rise. The use of contrast contributes to the development of the theme of captivity. Should the speaker had not used the words “dull cage” and “bone-house” to contrast with the descriptive words “dare-gale” and “mounting,” the idea of confinement would not have been established. It is through the use of contrast that the reader is able to infer that the “dare-gale skylark” is held captive “in a dull cage.”

Xu and Hopkins’ poems both explore the idea of captivity, although their exploration of the theme is done in different styles. Xu, in his free-verse poem, utilizes a structure that is free from any fixed forms, such as rhyming patterns and stanzas, whereas Hopkins makes use of a Petrarchan sonnet structure, which employs a rhyme scheme and a division of the poem into an octave and a sestet. Both poems engage with the theme of captivity; however, Hopkins’ The Caged Skylark differs from Xu’s I Fall Asleep, Just Standing Like That in that it contains a volta, which is characteristic of sonnets, that creates a shift in the mood of the poem and a slight turn of thought in terms of the theme. In comparison, Xu’s poem does not contain this shift or turn, but, instead, centres on the idea of captivity from the start through the end. Ultimately, the development of the poems’ theme is achieved through the use of various literary devices. Certain literary devices are shared by both poems, such as caesura. Other literary devices are specific to one poem, such as simile in Xu’s poem and contrast in Hopkins’. Both Xu and Hopkins skillfully incorporate such literary devices in articulating the message of their respective poems.