Blog3: peace

“Peace” by George Herbert

Peace is a poem by George Herbert which uses Connotation/ Denotation and Imagery to not only tell the story of one’s search for peace, but also to show where he ended up finding the answer to his search. “Peace” begins by George Herbert talking about one’s search for peace; there are three main images that he gives of where peace is searched for. The first image is of him looking in a secret cave, away from society and without disturbance. The response to his first search is a “hollow wind” that answered “No, Go seek elsewhere”. The next image of him searching for peace is of him searching the land of which he saw a rainbow: the sky. But it turned out that the clouds immediately went away so the rainbow in turn disappeared. The final physical place he searches is a garden in which he found a flower that he dug up. At the root of the flower there was a worm that had eaten away the roots of the beautiful Crown Imperial. These three instances are three instances of the imagery that Herbert uses to depict and describe the search for peace.
The second main part of the poem is the part in which the denotation/connation is shown. This part of the poem is where he encounters an old man who tells him the story of a prince which lived a good life and he ended up dying from his foes. But after his death “12 stalks of wheat” grew out of his life. The Denotation of this image is the 12 stalks of wheat growing and spreading throughout the world. The connotation of this image is of Jesus being scorned upon and his foes killing him; but in the end his 12 disciples, who the wheat represented, were able to spread the word of the lord throughout the entire world. The best point of this poem is that the peace wasn’t found in any physical place, but in the message that the old man had about this prince.