The Colonel Analysis free essay sample

The Colonel† In the poem â€Å"The Colonel,† Carolyn Forche recounts a cruel encounter with the titles main character of interest while working for Amnesty International in El Salvador. The colonel personality can best be summed as a remorseless man in a chaotic country where violence is customary to the colonel and his people. He also cares not for the civil liberties of the citizens of El Salvador that he governs or the fact that he is revealing his evil personality to Forche with no compunction. The theme for â€Å"The Colonel† could be that if people see that wrong is being done in their presence they should try their best to give those a voice that don’t have one. The poem begins with Forche narrating saying, â€Å"What you have heard is true. I was in his house. His wife carried a tray of coffee and sugar. His daughter filed her nails, his son went out for the night† (1-2). We will write a custom essay sample on The Colonel Analysis or any similar topic specifically for you Do Not WasteYour Time HIRE WRITER Only 13.90 / page The colonel’s family is seemingly normal and the setting of the encounter is very homey and domestic. No one would ever suspect a killer lived in the very same house Forche is visiting. However, this scene begins to change after the first and second lines and then the reader begins to see that the speaker is trying to foreshadowing some sort of evil is about to take place. For instance, in line three the speaker talks about the colonel† keeping a pistol next to him on a cushion†. This should give the reader an indication of something not being right or that the colonel must protect himself at all times for he is a very wanted man of his people. Furthermore, in lines 4-5 Forche then speaks of broken bottles embedded in the walls around and what they could be used for (i. . to scoop the man’s kneecaps from his legs or cut his hands to lace). Also in line 6, â€Å"On the windows there were gratings like those in liquor stores. † This indicates that maybe the colonel has some enemies and that he is trying to keep them out of his home. After line six the poem’s setting becomes calm again when the speaker and the colonel begin to eat their rack of lamb, good wine, mangoes with salt, and a type of bread (6-8). However, the setting almost immediately begins to transform when Forche is told by the colonel that his people have become hard to govern (9-10). After that the parrot says hello on the terrace, but the colonel quickly tells it to shut up and then says with his eyes to Forche â€Å"say nothing† (10-11). This is one of the many pieces of substantiation that the colonel has a violent nature and that his authority is not to be in question; this will soon foretell his wicked hobby. The colonel comes back to Forche with a grocery sack full of human ears in it and spills them on the kitchen table (12-13). The reader can tell that the colonel enjoys flaunting his immoral deeds to others as a means of asserting his power. Forche then begins to describe the ordeal in grim detail. For example, â€Å"They were like dried peach halves,† (13) or â€Å"He took one of them in his hands, shook it in our faces, dropped it into the water glass. It came alive there. † (13-14) Forche probably does this so the reader can easily visualize what the whole ordeal was like for the speaker. The colonel then says â€Å"I am tired of fooling around he said. As for the rights of anyone, tell your people they can go **** themselves. † (15-16).