Critical Analysis of Beautiful Vagabonds - Essay Example

The universal theme the author is trying to describe is that life is indeed beautiful in all its forms—even if those forms take the shape of an insect or insect.
The subject of the poem is the animals that live in the swampy, namely, the insects.  We can think of these insects as a metaphor for ‘the othered’ people in life, or those who live on the fringes.

The idea of Others is that they are the people that are neglected to be taken care of in life.
However, the Other does indeed find a way to survive. “Often, individuals witness the cruelty of discrimination and intolerance of the ‘different’ or of ‘the other’ and do not know how to respond even though they find it distressing and want to take action.

Perhaps they are caught off-guard or, they experience such a strong emotional response they cannot form a rational verbal response” (Angelini, 2011: 344). Even though these poor bugs are so often forgotten about in the rustle of everyday life, it only makes sense that this poem exemplifies them in Beautiful Vagabonds.
The universal idea that is expressed by the subject of this poem is that even small things in life (like insects) are precious.

More will be discussed about the universal themes of this poem concerning universal themes in the next section.
One can’t help but wonder if the title Beautiful Vagabonds was taken from the following quote by John Burroughs, but it is a fitting one indeed. “The beautiful vagabonds, endowed with every grace, masters of all climes, and knowing no bounds—how many human aspirations are realized in their free, holiday-lives—and how many suggestions to the poet in their flight and song” (Burroughs, 1877: 10).

The poem itself gives a beautiful description of the freedom these insects have and how they live such carefree lives. Perhaps it is the words of the poem themselves which have the most lasting impact upon us.
We realize that the universal theme here is mortality and that everything and everyone on the earth must enjoy life before living things have come to the final season or stage of life—the dying stage.
It is easy to let life pass us by quickly, but in the end, life is very short. In that case, one must say “Carpe diem,” or ‘Seize the day’—literally meaning “pluck the day” in Latin.
It only makes sense that we should indeed not take life for granted, but continue to live life in the fullness of its greatness. For, we must realize that one day all life will come to an end, so we must enjoy the beauty and freedom we have while we are alive, in all of its many forms.
Desi Di’Nardo’s poem Beautiful Vagabonds takes us on a journey through nature, telling us the intimate details of the lives of small animals—in this case, insects. Even though the insects are small, they remind us of the delicateness and fragility of life and relationships.
The poet of this piece is showing us the universal value of the fact that life is beautiful, in whatever shape or form it takes. The subjects of the poem, the small animals, remind us that even the smaller things in life are precious.
The actual poem itself talks about mortality in the sense that all beauty in life must eventually come to an end—as we see the carefree insects romp about, but we know that it won’t last forever.
Thusly, in this poem we have seen universal themes abound, the descriptions having been shown to explicate:  the poet who wrote the poem; the subject of the poem; and the poem itself in terms of what it was trying to get across to readers.