Poetry Critique

Castles Made of Sand by Jimi Hendrix
lyricsdomain.com

A little Indian brave who before he was ten, played war games in
the woods with his Indian friends, and he built a dream that when he
grew up, he would be a fearless warrior Indian Chief.

Many moons passed and more the dream grew strong, until tomorrow
He would sing his first war song,
And fight his first battle, but something went wrong,
Suprise attack killed him in his sleep that night

And so castles made of sand, melts into the sea eventually.

I chose this poem because I found the poem to be unique on many levels. Unlike a conventional poem, this poem has an off-beat rhythm to it when read. Jimi also wrote this into a song, and I like the song a lot.

Castles made of sand are very weak and can fall apart instantly. This title is ironic because castles are generally very sturdy fortresses but sand castles are the opposite. They are very brittle and can fall apart easily. The purpose of this title was to show that anything can immediately disappear or end. In the poem, the Indian boy planned his whole life around being a brave Indian chief, but his life ended unexpectedly.

The phrase "castles made of sand" is a metaphor for the the story of the indian boy. This helps to emphasize the moral of the story. The phrase "Many moons passed, and more the dream grew strong" is an alliteration because it uses the same first letter consanent multiple times. This also helps create an image of many nights passing as the boy dreamed about his goal of becoming a fierce Indian chief.

The tone of the is somber. It conveys a depressing tone because it builds up an optimistic story then crushes it with a pessimistic ending. The author did a good job conveying this tone because he builds up the story with lots of descriptive words, then ends it abruptly with a short sentence. "surprise attack killed him in his sleep that night"