In "Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold" Edward Taylor personifies a wasp as a beautiful woman. In a puritan culture, describing a beautiful woman was against society, but the speaker personifies a wasp to escape this. It is ironic that the speaker chooses to describe the beauty of a wasp because a wasp was referred to as "annoying" in the Old Testament. This may have been another way of avoiding puritan society. At the end of the poem, the speaker asks God to clear his mind. This can be seen as a way to ask for forgiveness from God and other puritans.
Instead of describing a beautiful woman in the poem, the speaker characterizes a wasp to avoid the consequences of a conservative puritan culture. "In Sol's warm breath and shine as saving, / Which with her h
The second stanza of the poem is asking God to clear his mind so that he can see God's beauty. This can be seen as a way of asking for forgiveness from God and other puritans. Although the speaker indirectly described a beautiful woman, the speaker wants other puritans to be assured of his own knowledge of his sins. "Lord, clear my misted sight that I / May hence view Thy Divinity" (Taylor l. 30) shows how the speaker asks God to cleanse his mind so that he only sees the beauty of God. In the second stanza the speaker begins to directly talk about the wasp. "A nimble Spirit bravely mind / Her work in every limb" (Taylor ll. 36-37) compliments a wasp's sharp mind and it's work.
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