How do the authors of Long Distance, The Sick Equation and My Grandmother enable us to understand the relationships described in the poems? In ‘Long Distance’, the rhyming pattern is abab cdcd efef, but in stanza four it changes. The rhyme pattern then changes to ghhg. The slowing down of the pace when you read the fourth stanza is very effective. The new tone and pace gives the poem a feeling of sadness. In the …showed first 75 words of 1641 total…

…showed last 75 words of 1641 total…upon past and present relationships with loved ones e.g. parents or grandparents. They examine feelings of loss, bereavement, grief, guilt, anger and pain. They look at how these relationships from the past impact upon them in the present. The poems also look at how some people hold onto the past and have difficulty moving on. I feel that all the poems are equally effective in portraying the structures of relationships. By Marc O’Brien