American Literature / Unit 17 AML 1617 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Theodore Roethke's Late Work
Captions available
The idea
The son of a greenhouse owner, Roethke built a language out of what the witness calls the greenhouse world of tiny insects and unseen roots, writing lines like worm, be with me, this is my hard time. His love poems in Words for the Wind celebrate beauty with innocent passion.
In practice
Roots, insects, and a private vocabulary.
Where people slip
The greenhouse was a real childhood.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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