The Bloody Sire

In The Bloody Sire Robinson Jeffers tries to get the point across that war is not always a bad thing. What he is trying to say is even though war is violent and ugly, it is necessary. Not only does he believe that war is necessary, but he believes that war is what made the world what it is today. Jeffers points out that maybe something like violence, which the world perceives to be wrong, is actually right. He plays with the idea that maybe what is wrong, is not always wrong; maybe it can sometimes be right. Jeffers starts out the poem by saying, "It is not bad. Let them play." Essentially letting the reader know what he believes right off the bat. He then creates an image of war in the readers head by using such lines as, "Let the guns bark and the bombing-place speak his prodigious blasphemies." Putting the reader in a mind set of war time; picturing planes bombing troops and gunfire in the background. He then proceeds to again say how "It is not bad, it is high time." Now pressing the issue that violence shapes society and its value's he says, "stark violence is still the sire of all the world's values."

Jeffers uses imagery as a major part of The Bloody Sire. He tries to get the reader to imagine these bloody scenes of war and violence. "What but the wolf's tooth chiseled so fine. The fleet limbs on the antelope?" Making the reader imagine the wolf and his prey, the antelope. Imagining the wolf chasing the antelope down and ripping it to shreds with its finely chiseled teeth. He then again states, "Violence has been the sire of all the world's values." Implying that violence shapes the values of all the world; even the animal kingdom. Even animals need violence to thrive and survive. Without violence how would the wolf feed, how would it survive?

Jeffers goes on to imply that without violence the history of the world would not be what it is today. He says, "who would remember Helen's face lacking the terrible halo of spears?" Speaking about Helen of Troy, the face that sailed one thousand ships. Had the kidnapping of Helen not started the Trojan War, who would remember her as significant? He then goes on to say, "who formed Christ but Herod and Caesar, the cruel and bloody victories of Caesar?" Jeffers says that wihtout the violent death of Jesus Christ and the bloody war victories of Caesar, neither of these two men would be remembered. And once again, Jeffers goes back to his main point in saying that "violence has been the