Elizabeth Bishop has often been linked to the poetic canon of the 'confessional poets' of the 1960s and 1970s. Confessional poetry focused largely on the poet, exposing his or her personal insecurities and vulnerabilities. Bishop, however, was best known for her insistence on staying out of this movement. To be called a confessional poet “would have horrified the very correct and obsessively discreet author” (Gioia 19). He seemed to express the opinion that the tragedies in a poet's mind should not be found on the page. As Bishop once said about confessional poets, “You wish they would keep some of these things to themselves” (Costello 334). Despite his beliefs, Bishop's personal life was so full of tragedy and alienation that he sought a way to express his experiences through his work. Poetry, especially during this period of total lyrical exposure, became the perfect means to overcome his pain. His colleagues had set the standard for public reception of such personal poetry, and Bishop sought to use their idea of ​​self-recovery in his own, much more subtle way. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on "Why Violent Video Games Shouldn't Be Banned"? Get an Original Essay Importantly, we must recognize both the slight commonality and the stark difference between Bishop and the confessional poets. Confessional poetry often “dealt with topics that had not previously been openly discussed in American poetry. Private experiences and feelings about death, trauma, depression, and relationships have been addressed in this type of poetry, often in an autobiographical manner” (“A Brief Guide”). Considering this, we see a connection between Bishop and other confessional poets. Despite his determination to make himself known outside of confessional canons, his work somehow lends itself to expressing personal experiences and emotions. The difference is that Bishop extends beyond the “confessional” label largely by using formal poetic techniques to acknowledge and process his personal pain. He uses many formal forms, especially narrative tone and understatement, to express private experiences in a rather subtle and personal way. Through the use of these techniques in the poems "In the Waiting Room" and "One Art" we can see how Elizabeth Bishop's exercise of personal experience works beyond the limits of "confessional poetry" and becomes more about the reconciliation of sense of loss in her. life. “In the Waiting Room” is a poem that reads like a personal narrative from the point of view of a young girl. Here we see a little girl who, while waiting for her aunt in a dentist's office, has an epiphany about her gender identity. Bishop presents this poem as a scene, providing immense detail from the exact location – “Worcester, Massachusetts” – to the time of year – “It was winter. It got dark early” (Bishop 159). This prose narrative suggests that Bishop is telling us a story, presumably about herself as she gives the speaker her name. If we consider this poem as autobiographical, then we can understand how there are two points of view: there is the perspective of the young Elizabeth and that of the adult, and these two points of view work to reconcile Bishop's sense of identity. This is a poem of a little girl learning what it means to live in the world as a woman, as well as an adult using this memory to come to terms with her current female identity. As the little girl sits in the waiting room, reading a National Geographic with photos of tortured women, she begins to question the identity she once believed she had: "But I heard: you arean I, you are an Elizabeth, you are one of them". (Bishop 160). She refuses to consider herself one of these women, because to become a woman is to become the other, the oppressed. Her fears are strengthened by the violence that the magazine he describes against those “black, naked women” in the outside world connects with his world – as he hears a cry of pain coming from his aunt in the dentist's office (Bishop 159). He finally sees the constituents of the gender he must accept they are “all but one,” a diminished and oppressed group of women; she feels as if she is drowning under the “great black wave” of responsibilities that coincide with being a woman. As Bishop recalls this memory, we can see how the narrative tone of this work functions as a way to reconcile with her own identity. As she examines the incident with a story-like quality, she is able to disconnect from the experience she fears being an outcast, but rather a grown adult who challenges being “a foolish and timid woman” by expressing her emotions through her art (Bishop 160). As an adult woman, she has experienced firsthand those responsibilities that young Elizabeth understands to be frighteningly overwhelming and harsh. Now that she has lived as a woman and written about her personal anxieties, Bishop is able to accept the inevitability of her role in society. She is able to move forward through her life, just as the poem, in its final stanza, portrays the world moving forward after the young girl's epiphany. “One Art,” when examined in the context of Bishop’s life, is certainly far more personal and heartbreaking poetry than anything else in its cache. Published in her book Geography III in 1976, "One Art" was written after Bishop had moved from Brazil - supposedly the only place she could ever call home - and after her former lover Lota de Macedo Soares had committed suicide. In the wake of these events, it's not hard to imagine “One Art” as a way for Bishop to master the recurring sense of loss in his life. This poem is “distinctly Bishopian in its restraint, formality, classicism. Yet…he faces the loss openly and has rightly been called…painfully autobiographical." (McCabe 27). Through his repetition we see a sort of rationalization of the tragedies of his life. Combining the loss of "a continent" and the his lover with such trivial things as “lost door keys” or “an hour misspent,” Bishop attempts to marginalize his grief regarding those losses (Bishop 178). see the ironic disdain of the pain he is expressing through the lines “—Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture I love) I would not have lied” (Bishop 178). of loss - and by extension his own grief - to become much less significant. Bishop also brilliantly uses the rigorous formality of this type of villanelle poetry to work through his emotions poetry, forcing her to recognize and “master” it so she can move forward (Bishop 178). Yet the subtle beauty of Bishop's technique lies in what Kathleen Spivak calls “surprising irregularity” and how “Bishop, a perfectionist, chose the breakdown of metrics” as “significant and deliberate” (Spivak 507). Towards the final lines, the emotions held back by the strict villanelle form begin to break down. Now, mastering the art of losing has gone from being “not hard” to “not too hard,” suggesting that there is still a feeling of pain and difficulty every time she is forced to face the.