Explication of A Man With Night Sweats

    Chapter 4 explains the rhetorical device of Imagery to the reader and I thought the set of poems they provided as examples was very interesting and insightful. The speaker is describing the uncomfortability and weirdness he feels by experiencing these night sweats. The narrator compares his skin breaking a sweat to a shield being cracked and broken. I did some research and the night sweats this poem describes is very similar to the symptoms of a person infected with HIV/AIDS. I see how this poem follows almost the breakdown of a person, and the suffering that comes with this illness. Not only is it physically debilitating, it is mentally debilitating, "My mind reduced to hurry, My flesh reduced and wrecked". He compares his life crumbling down on him, to an avalanche. An avalanche he wishes his hands were strong enough to hold back, yet his body is becoming weaker and weaker each night he fights through these night sweats.