96 vandam Analysis

The speaker in the poem "96 Vandam" is a homeless person who is travelling around for a home. There is selfless feeling about the whole poem, like the homeless person doesn't want to bother people for a place to stay and that he/she just wants to live in a nice house/apartment. The sorts of imagery in the poem start with "I am going to carry my bed into New York City tonight." (Stern 1) This menas that now the homeless person is on his/her way to New York City to search for a place to stay. "Dangling sheets and ripped blankets" (Stern 2) tells that it is, indeed a homeless person because he/she has tattered sheets that are probably dirty and filthy form him/her sleeping everywhere. "Push it across three dark highways" (Stern 3) means that the homeless person is lonely and has a long way to travel to get to New York City or where ever else he/she is going. "Exausted friends" imply that he/she doesn't want to bother anybody to take him/her in for the nights that the homeless person is alone. "In case a dream or fantasy should pass by" (Stern 9) is a personification because dreams and fanatsies can't "pass by" like humans and it means that in case he/she is tired and just wants to go to sleep, the homless person will have something to sleep on to "catch" the fantasy or dream. "Wake up dazed and hungry" (Stern 10) means that the homeless person just wants to live in a normal apratment/house where he/she can wake up "dazed and hungry" like people do in the mornings. "Garbage grinding" (Stern 11) means that the gargabe truck in his fanatsy is picking up garbage and compressing it into the truck. "Smell of coffee cooking" (Stern 12) means that the homeless person would like to drink coffee again, and maybe take it to work like people do. The whole poem repeats "I am" and "I want" at the beginnings of every 2 lines besides the last 4.
These elements help us understand the meaning of this poem because they give us the feeling of being a homeless person and givng us a taste of what these people yearn or try to do in life and
giving us a tast e of what they lost. The meaning of this poem is that the homeless person and maybe others would just like a another chance at life.