Romeo and Juliet Essay

In the tragedy Romeo and Juliet, the person who is to blame for Romeo and Juliet’s deaths is Friar Lawrence, the priest. It is his fault because he is the one who marries them thinking it will fix everything, he is the one who makes the plan that falls apart, and it is a lot his fault that the plan fell through.

It is Friar Lawrence’s fault because he is the one who marries Romeo and Juliet. He thinks that marrying them will end the feud between the families. In act 2 scene 3, Romeo comes to Friar Lawrence’s cell to ask if he can wed him and Juliet. Friar says, “For this alliance may so happy prove/ To turn your households’ rancor to pure love.” Friar thinks if Romeo and Juliet wed the Capulets and Montagues will stop fighting and start loving each other. This is not a good decision because if the feud doesn’t stop, which it doesn’t, Romeo and Juliet will still be married, and will make more fighting than before.

Friar Lawrence is also to blame because he is the one who designs the pan that ends up falling apart. His plan was for Juliet to say she would marry Paris, then pretend to die with a special sleeping potion, then tell Romeo of the plan and when Juliet wakes up, they will run away together. In act 4 scene 1, Juliet is very upset because Romeo is banished, her father is forcing her to marry Paris or else she is thrown out into the streets, and her nurse thinks she should also marry Paris. Juliet says she’d rather kill herself than marry Paris, so Friar tells her, “If, rather than to marry County Paris/ Thou hast the strength of will to slay thyself/ Then is it likely thou wilt undertake/ A thing like death to chide away this shame/ That cop’st with death himself to ‘scape from it/ And if thou darest, I’ll give thee remedy.” This is Friar telling Juliet that if she’d really rather die, than if she dares he will give her the solution, which is to pretend to die, which is a bad plan because if one thing goes wrong then everything falls apart.

Then it’s Friar’s fault because the plan fails. First what happens in act 5 scene 1, Balthasar sees Juliet being buried and tells Romeo, “Her body sleeps in Capels’ monument/ And her immortal part with angels lives.” Then, once Romeo thinks Juliet is dead, he leaves from Mantua and goes back to Verona, before getting the letter telling him that Juliet is not actually dead, (and buys poison.) Then he breaks into Juliet’s tomb and sees Paris and they fight and he kills him. Then in act 5 scene 3, Romeo drinks the poison and says, “Here’s to my love (drinking) O true apothecary/ Thy drugs are quick. Thus with a kiss I die.” Then after Romeo dies, Juliet wakes up and tells Friar Lawrence who came to take her away to go on without her. Then she wants to drink the poison but Romeo drank it all so Juliet says, “Yea, noise? Then I’ll be brief. O, happy dagger/ This is thy sheath. There rust and let me die.” So since all this went wrong, instead of his plan working, they both end up dead.

All in all, the whole catastrophe of Romeo and Juliet, the person responsible for this is Friar Lawrence. It is his fault because he is the one who weds the two of them thinking it will solve the long lasting grudge between Montagues and Capulets, he is the one who schemes the whole plan to have everything work out, when everything turns out the exact opposite. Some faults may fall on other characters, but the Friar has the most responsibility of the heartbreak of Romeo and his Juliet.

Sonnet

shall I compare thee to a winter day
the coldness is like a blanket to me
 snow and then the rain to wash it away
a white covering over the city

the snowflakes fall on to my mouth and nose
they drift on to my eyelash and then melt
when it clears the trees then begin to show
and in the park the snowballs are to pelt

oh how I love thee snow, so wise so cold
I dance along the sidewalk oh so happy
each snow drop is unique so I am told
maybe some hot chocolate or some tea

oh thou winter sparkles in the moonlight
after the cold day I must say goodnight

Martin Espada Essay

Martin Espada’s poems, “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson,” “Two Mexicanos Lynched, May 3,1877,” and “The New Bathroom Policy at an English High School,” make us think about the different levels of power each group/person have and how they use their power.

 The poem “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson” is about when the speaker’s name is mispronounced, he thinks about what he would do if he had the power to do it. In the first stanza, the speaker says, “Whenever my name is mispronounced/ I want to buy a toy pistol.” This makes you think about how the people who mispronounce his name have the power to upset him so much, possibly without realizing it. They don’t notice that they have this power, or they would make an effort to pronounce his name correctly. And it’s not just others mispronouncing his name, but also that they  do not care enough about the speaker’s feelings and culture. In the fourth stanza, the speaker says, “hijack a busload of Republican tourists/ from Wisconsin/ force them to chant anti- American slogans/ in Spanish.” The speaker is fantasizing about having power because he feels powerless.

            Also, in the poem, “Two Mexicanos Lynched, May 3,1877,” which is about two Mexicanos who were hung by 40 white vigilantes and then the 40 men taking a picture with the Mexicanos bodies, a crowd can create a power of its own. In the first stanza the speaker says, “Forty gringo vigilantes/ cheered the rope/ that snapped two Mexicanos.” This line shows that the people who hung the Mexicanos have the power because there are forty of them and only two Mexicanos, so they couldn’t fight back. They abuse this power by hanging them and killing them. And, vigilantes are people who take the law into their own hands, so these men thought that the law against killing didn’t apply to them and that it was okay. In the last stanza of this poem the speaker says, “from the shade of bowler hats/ but all crowding in to the photograph.” This line shows that the crowd around them has the power, because they are all watching this and if they all stood up, they could stop this horrible thing they’re doing to the Mexicanos. They do not use this power, instead they all crowd around to take a picture with the bodies, as if it is a trophy and they’re extremely proud of what they’ve done.

            In the last poem, “The New Bathroom Policy at an English School,” which is a poem about boys who talk Spanish and the principal doesn’t understand them so he decides to ban Spanish, the power moves between the characters and ends up strongly with one. In the second stanza, the speaker says, “listens from the stall/ the only word he recognizes/ is his own name/ and this constipates him.” This shows that while boys are speaking Spanish, the principal can’t understand them, which upsets him, showing that the boys have a power over him yet they don’t understand they do. They are just talking in their language, that’s normal to them; they don’t realize they have a power over their principal. In the last stanza, the speaker says, “So he decides to ban Spanish/ in the bathrooms/ now he can relax.” This line shows that the principal has the power because he runs the school, and if something upsets him, he can end it. The principal abuses this power by stopping the use of Spanish in bathrooms, which is taking away someone’s right, because he can’t understand something and he feels that that is taking away his power in the school.

            To conclude, all of Martin Espada’s poems, “Revolutionary Spanish Lesson,” “Two Mexicanos Lynched, May 3,1877,” and “The New Bathroom Policy at an English High School,” all share a theme, of teaching the reader who has the power in the poem and how they are using this power. It makes you think about how you use the power you have even if you don’t realize you have the power you do. These poems want to show the reader that you have to be careful with what you say and do and how it affects others, and to pay attention to the power that you have.