Slam+Poetry

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The Lanyard - Billy Collins
The other day I was ricocheting slowly off the blue walls of this room, moving as if underwater from typewriter to piano, from bookshelf to an envelope lying on the floor, when I found myself in the L section of the dictionary where my eyes fell upon the word lanyard.

No cookie nibbled by a French novelist could send one into the past more suddenly— a past where I sat at a workbench at a camp by a deep Adirondack lake learning how to braid long thin plastic strips into a lanyard, a gift for my mother.

I had never seen anyone use a lanyard or wear one, if that’s what you did with them, but that did not keep me from crossing strand over strand again and again until I had made a boxy red and white lanyard for my mother.

She gave me life and milk from her breasts, and I gave her a lanyard. She nursed me in many a sick room, lifted spoons of medicine to my lips, laid cold face-cloths on my forehead, and then led me out into the airy light

and taught me to walk and swim, and I, in turn, presented her with a lanyard. Here are thousands of meals, she said, and here is clothing and a good education. And here is your lanyard, I replied, which I made with a little help from a counselor.

Here is a breathing body and a beating heart, strong legs, bones and teeth, and two clear eyes to read the world, she whispered, and here, I said, is the lanyard I made at camp. And here, I wish to say to her now, is a smaller gift—not the worn truth

that you can never repay your mother, but the rueful admission that when she took the two-tone lanyard from my hand, I was as sure as a boy could be that this useless, worthless thing I wove out of boredom would be enough to make us even.

Important words and phrases
The most important word is obviously Lanyard anything else and this poem would not be the same. The phrase "make us even" is also important because it is so clearly tells you how the little boy feels. All the things the mom is giving him are very carefully chosen and very important like a thousand meals, a good education ans two clear eyes to read the world.

Theme
This poem explores the complex relationship between children and their Mothers. Mothers give so much to their children, but they dont expect anything in return. Mothers somehow make you feel like you've given you something they've always dreamed of when you hand them a card covered in glitter, daisies you picked in the backyard, or in this case a lanyard. This poem showcases the relationship.

Poetic Devices
This poem mostly uses imagery like breathing body, beating heart, airy light. This poem also uses lots of personification, because the mother is handing him things you can really hold, like a good education and a beating heart. There is also a lot of condensing of time like when she gives him thousands of meals, which obviously she cant hand him all at once.