Chainsaw Versus the Pampas Grass and the Gun

...

This phrase also leads onto the references of disturbing or morally contradictory sources of excitement which are present in both poems. The only other time in the gun when a one-line stanza is used is at the very beginning when we are told ‘Bringing a gun into a house changes it’. When we see this we expect a negative change as a gun is an inflictor of violence. However, when the phrase ‘A gun brings a house alive’ is shown very near the end, we see through the use of the word ‘alive’, a paradox through an ironic cycle of murdering and feeling more ‘alive’ after. It shows the excitement and enthusiasm they feel as they seem to wake up from a life of mundanity and experience living for the first time. This violent idea of life through death is shown later on too, through the ‘King of Death’ and his ‘black mouth sprouting golden crocuses’. The word death is the only word in the poem that is given a capital letter to personify it as a person which makes it stand out on the page showing once again the importance of death in their lives as it seems to be the only living thing to them as it is the only thing which gives them a sense of purpose. It also shows the poems uncomfortably joyful ending in abundance and life through the ‘golden’ suggesting value and ‘crocuses’ symbolising life. This is similar to Chainsaw Versus the Pampas Grass as it also replicates the same sadistic pleasure that a serial killer would feel through their violent acts. In Chainsaw Versus the Pampas Grass there is also a strong sense of coming alive and feeling for the first time which is shown through the last two lines of the third stanza in which the first reference to any of his feelings are shown directly after he took he chainsaw and ‘lifted it into the sun’. This phrase creates the image of a kind of religious ceremony which is similar to the ‘King of the Death’ in the gun as they both seem to worshiping something that is dark and violent showing them as they give in to their guilty desires. He is said to have ‘felt the hundred beats per second’ and ‘felt the drive-wheel gargle’ which references both his hearing and tasting senses and shows his rush of adrenaline as the chainsaw brings him alive. After violently cutting down the pampas grass he says ‘Overkill’ which is shown as a one-word sentence making it feel even more dramatic as though he is proud of the destruction he has caused.

In both poems we see the power violence has as it takes over people’s lives giving them a distorted sense of achievement. There are common tones of irony which are used to show themes of death, life through death, weapons, vicariousness and psychopathic tendencies of feeling excitement through morally wrong acts.