Question

Identify examples of personification in “Building with Its Face Blown Off” by Billy Collins. What is the effect of that figurative language?

250words

Answer 1

In the Poem "Building with Its Face Blown Off", Billy Collins portrays a Post-War scenario of a Building. At various portions of the poem, he personified the building to present the it as an individual having emotions. Examples of personification are:

1. As if the room had answered the explosion
   Wearing only its striped pajamas.
2. And the bathroom looks almost embarrassed
   By its uncovered ochre walls,
   The twisted mess of its plumbing,
3. The sink sinking to its knees,

The Poem leaves an effect that how insignificant yet sad a war can be. Insignificant because however and whatever occurs in a war, whatever gets destroyed, and no matter if people die, things are still reconstructed and lives are rebuilt. People keep living no matter how shattered they are. This is portrayed in the lines

• "And stare up at the hanging staircase, The portrait of a grandfather, A door dangling from a single hinge."

,and

• "A light snow still falling On a distant steeple, and people Crossing a bridge that still stands.",

showing that people still move on and there are things that still hold on and continue to exist.

It is sad because it reveals the intensity of the destruction on the building and people's lives, and how in a far away land there are people still unmoved by this. This is depicted in the lines

• "And the bathroom looks almost embarrassed By its uncovered ochre walls, The twisted mess of its plumbing,
• The sink sinking to its knees, The ripped shower curtain, The torn goldfish trailing bubbles.
• It’s like a dollhouse view As if a child on its knees could reach in And pick up the bureau, straighten a picture.
• Or it might be a room on a stage In a play with no characters, No dialogue or audience, No beginning, middle and end- Just the broken furniture in the street, A shoe among the cinder blocks,"

,and

• "And even farther on, in another country On a blanket under a shade tree, A man pouring wine into two glasses
• And a woman sliding out The wooden pegs of a wicker hamper Filled with bread, cheese, and several kinds of olives."