There are many poems that have several similarities.  Even though they do compare in many ways all poems are unique in their own separate ways.  "For My Daughter", "The Heart", and "Annabel Lee" all have one common interest and that is their main theme.  Long with this similarity they have other comparisons that lead to their main theme.  These comparisons might be the same, but they are used differently which makes each poem different.

    "For My Daughter", by Weldon Kees, has very strong words that introduce the beginning tone of the poem.  The tone at the beginning gives the reader the first impression of what the poem will be like.  This tone starts with love, the love the father has for his daughter.  His love comes across to be very strong.

    As the poem continues on, the tone changes drastically.  This change hints to the reader that a problem occurred between the father and the daughter.  The tone is very harsh.  The change in the tone really makes the reader think about what had happened that could have distroyed the wonderful father-daughter love that was clearly present in the first few lines. The reason why the reader senses a strong love for his daughter at the beginning and a hatred at the end is due to the words the author uses.

    The language that Kees uses at the beginning tells the reader that the father feels strongly for his daughter.  "Looking into my daughter’s eyes…"(Kees, 1) shows the reader the father’s passionate love, the passionate love a father should have toward his daughter.  After a brief description about the daughter, the author quickly changes the words to seem very cold.  "… hintings of death she does not heed"(Kees, 3) begins the language change.  It continues on by describing the father’s hatred through words about war.  Finally, in the last the reader reads a very strong line, "I have no daughter.  I desire none."(Kees, 13)

    "The Heart", by Stephen Crane, also uses tone and language to express the main point in the poem.  Tone and language are not used in the same way as in "For My daughter".

    The tone in "The Heart" begins with a depressed tone and that tone stays the same throughout the poem.  This tone is very straight forward to the reader because of the strong, subtle language used.  The author has a very short description at the beginning.  "Held his heart in his hands, And ate of it."(Crane, 5) is the first part where the reader gets the idea that something went wrong in the man’s life.  As the poem continues and the narrator enters the poem.  The narrator asks a very important question.  This question is very simple, yet very expressive.  "Is it good, friend?"(Crane, 6) leads the reader into the wondering if the character likes the way he is feeling.  When the character answers with, "It is bitter—bitter… But I like it…" then the reader is able to get the feeling of what the problem was the man has just encountered, a lose of love.

    Another poem that uses tone and language to get across the main theme is "Annabel Lee", by Edgar Allen Poe.  This poem has very different language than "The Heart" and "For My Daughter".  As the poem begins the reader gets the sense that the poem will be a fairy tale because of the language the author uses.  He uses words like maiden, many year ago, and kingdom.  All of these words put together the setting in the poem.

    In "Annabel Lee" the language is not as direct, it is more of a typical poem.  There is a lot of repetition of words throughout the poem.  The words that are repeated are used to express the tone.  Annabel Lee is repeated a lot during the poem.  The narrator is emphasizing his love for Annabel Lee.  "In this kingdom by the sea"(Poe, 2) is also repeated many times in the poem.  This phrase is stressing the place where the narrator met his love, lost his love, and where his love died.  This is important to express the narrator’s undying love for Annabel Lee.

    The language all leads up to the tone that changes in the story.  At the beginning the tone is happy because the narrator is describing his love and how he loves her.  The tone then changes because of someone is steeling the narrator’s love from him. The narrator then takes action and the tone quickly changes into obsession.  The reader begins to get the sense that the narrator is crazy over Annabel Lee.  He is so crazy over her that she dies.

    "For My Daughter", "The Heart", and "Annabel Lee" all use tone and language to form the main theme of each poem.  The common theme they share is love that turns bad.  In each of these poems main character or the narrator is expressing an undying love for someone.  The wonderful love starts out to be wonderful. In "Annabel Lee" the narrator states, "But we loved with a love that was more than love… With a love that the winged seraphs of Heaven Converted her to me"(Poe, 9-11)  He is expressing how marvelous his love is for Annabel Lee and that she feels the same way about him.  The author of "For My Daughter" says that his daughter is beautiful and the reader gets the impression that he loves her a lot.

    Both of these poems change, and follow the theme by the glorious love going bad.  In "Annabel Lee" the narrator gets obsessed with Annabel Lee and kills her.  He wants her to be his and no one else forever.  He keeps talking about how his love for her strong and that she loves him too.  He keeps obsessing about Annabel Lee.  Finally at the end he says that she looks so beautiful in the burial vault surrounded by the sea.

    "For My Daughter" is not an obsession that leads to the theme, but a hatred.  The father does into a hate spell.  He describes how his daughter has married or gotten involved with some other man.  This is his view of her turning on him.  He becomes very hateful towards her.  He starts comparing her the sights that would be seen in war, "That may hers appear: foul, lingering Death in certain war, the slim legs green."(Kees, 8-9) He then states at the end of the poem that he has no daughter and he does not want one.

    "The Heart" had the same theme as "Annabel Lee" and "For My Daughter", but there is a different approach to get to the theme.  "The Heart" deals with just the present. The reader gets a very strong notion that the man has been through a very tough time in his life.  He eats his heart, so to say, which is losing the love of his life.  He man is eating his heart and enjoying it.  The reader gets the impression that the man is obsessed with the lose of his love, that is why his heart is bitter even though he likes it.

    "For My Daughter", "Annabel Lee", and "The Heart" are all poems that use tone and language to express the theme in each of them.  The way each author uses tone and language within each of them is different.  Because they are all different poems using similar techniques they are able to signify the main theme, love gone bad.
 
 

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