Diving into the Wreck

Diving into the Wreck Literary Elements

Speaker or Narrator, and Point of View

first-person speaker who begins to identify with a larger "we" as the poem progresses

Form and Meter

ten stanzas of free-verse poetry

Metaphors and Similes

The poem as a whole can be viewed as a metaphorical conceit, in which diving into the wreck is a metaphor for looking deeply into the past in order to create new narratives and new poems.

The simile "I crawl like an insect" compares the speaker to an insect, emphasizing her smallness and sense of alienation from her everyday experience in the face of the vast ocean.

Alliteration and Assonance

alliteration: "body-armor of black rubber," "it pumps my blood with power," "carrying a knife, a camera"

Irony

Genre

lyric poem

Setting

at the site of a sea wreck

Tone

determined, steadfast

Protagonist and Antagonist

Major Conflict

Climax

Foreshadowing

Understatement

Allusions

Metonymy and Synecdoche

Personification

The poem briefly personifies the wreck, imagining that its "flank" is illuminated by a flashlight, and imagining its "drowned face always staring / toward the sun."

Hyperbole

Onomatopoeia

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