•Mae+V.+Cowdery

**Mae V. Cowdery**
by Matthew Hansen  Mae V. Cowdery was born in 1909 in Philadelphia, where she grew up. She attended Philadelphia High School for Girls, and later attended Pratt Institute. She lived in Greenwich Village, and visited Harlem very often. She became hugely popular for a few years, but then fell out of popularity. She committed suicide in New York City in 1953, when she was forty-four. She may have had a daughter; some of her poems hint at that, but there is very little biographical information about her, and no one knows for sure. Although there is not very much biographical information about Mae V. Cowdery, she was at one time hugely popular. When she was a junior in high school, she won a contest sponsored by the journal //Black Pearls//. She kept writing, and was one of the few women to publish a book in her time period. She interacted with the main figures of the Harlem Renaissance, including Hughes and other writers. She experienced a period of fame, and later died out in popularity. She was influential in her writing, and it was a major part of the Harlem Renaissance. Her writing deals heavily with the God is Kind God Is kind He lets us dream Of untarnished silver… Of skies that have never known The pain of a storm Of the peace and contentment In a robin’s even song

We dream of love Without its aftermath Of loneliness…

God Is kind He lets us dream Of unattainable things!

Initial reaction: I thought that this was a kind of pessimistic but optimistic piece. It says how God lets people dream about really good things, but we can’t attain them. Structure: There is an enjambment on almost every line. Some are more of a break than others, she puts the emphasis on “The pain of the storm” and “In a robin’s even song.” There is no rhyme; it is very free-verse. She repeats “God / Is kind / He lets us dream” Voice: The poet is someone who has experience, and feels that the ideal is no longer possible. The speaker is a narrator that has been happy, but is grateful that he/she can still dream of the impossible ideal. Denotation: untarnished=silver before it reacts with sulfur to make tarnish. Connotation:  · Untarnished=pure, inexperienced, not gone through hardships  · Pain of storm=intense agony- //pain// and //storm// increase the meaning of each other.  · Aftermath=the bad effects after the joy  · Dream=imagining the unattainable Poetic Devices: She alludes to a life without problems throughout the poem. This is done through a metaphor of pure things to the ideal life. Putting it all together: There is no such thing as ideal, it is all a myth. God didn’t make it like that, but He lets us escape to the perfect, pure place in our dreams. Bibliography Cowdery, Mae. "The Poet's Corner." //The Crisis// June 1930: 207. //The Crisis - Google Books//. Web. 14 Apr. 2011. Honey, Maureen. "Shadowed dreams: women's poetry of ... - Google Books." //Google Books//. N.p., n.d. Web. 14 Apr. 2011. Man Ray photo //. N.d. //English 288 Modernist American Poetry//. Web. 14 Apr. 2011.