The two poems I will be comparing are ‘Belfast confetti’ and ‘the border’ the two poems are about people affected by war and the consequences it has on people in the border poem a woman is returning to Iraq after a conflict forced her from her home and how she feels about returning home after a long time and in Belfast confetti the main protagonist is caught in a civil conflict for Ireland he describes how Belfast has become a war zone with military closing in on every corner and how it makes him feel being in the middle of this conflict.

Belfast confetti describes a war zone in Ireland where Molotov’s are being thrown and shots fired at civilians over the religion in Ireland but northern Ireland wants to stay as part oh the UK this created a civil war between protestants and Catholics for the future of Ireland but the protestants have the military on their side as they clear the area street by street the protagonist of the poem is overridden with fear as he uses metaphors to describe how the army shouts as they chase the Catholics down with guns. The protagonist of Belfast confetti seems like an innocent bystander in the middle of this conflict in the process of losing his home and how he feels trapped in his own town and what its like through his eyes.The concept of this poem is about how war can happen anywhere and what it makes people feel this is shown by what the protagonist describes as “raining exclamation marks” probably a metaphor for what the protagonist can hear such as explosions,gunshots and innocent people crying out.The protagonist also mentions how he know the area with “I know this labyrinth so well” another metaphor for his local area every alleyway and street is shown as a dead end this shows that the protagonist is becoming increasingly stressed and entrapped.In the final stanza the protagonist begins to question his origins where he comes from? where he is going? “a fusillade of question marks” this shows he has lost his mind in fear and proof of what conflict can do to the human mind and its effect on the innocent.

At he border is about what it is like to return to their home when a civil war is over at the beginning the refugee says “everything will taste different” meaning it will be a changed country in the third stanza the refugee’s sister makes a joke about one leg being in one country and the other leg in the other for this the border guards told her off probably because their country now needs harsh security to keep it safe.The refugee’s mother says the roads will be cleaner,the land more beautiful and the people much nicer since they are not in danger or under threat any more there were other families in line to cross the border one of them says “I can inhale home”