"A Fire Truck" by Richard Wilbur

1. Richard Wilbur's purpose of writing this poem is to thank firemen. The fire truck is describe as though he were in awe and respects the fire truck and what the firemen do. Wilbur gives an example of this in the line "and I have you to thanks" which was someone thanking a fireman for saving their life. In the line "thought is degraded action" Wilbur talks about the fact that firemen act on instinct and act on a moments notice. By the end of the poem he is describing what he saw when he witnessed the heroic acts of firemen in the line "your phoenix-red simplicity, enshrined in that not extinguished fire" which is another example of how he admires what firemen do.

2. "A Fire Truck" by Richard Wilbur is definately good poetry. It engages the reader by taking simply a red fire truck and turning it into something incredible by the use of descriptive words, example in the line "Beautiful, heavy, unweary, loud, obvious thing!". He really gets the reader to capture what he sees while he observes what most would not notice. Wilbur most definately choses the write language to use in this piece of poetry.