Two of the main elements in any poem are theme and symbolism. This holds true in Alicia Zakon’s poem titled “.” It essentially tells about the relationship between a man and a woman, and how the man has the remote control to the woman’s life. The symbols used are very meaningful to the overall theme. The theme of ‘Remote Control’ is also very important, and not just a topic for a good poem but a real problem in society too. The writing would be much less effective if not for the symbols used throughout the very strong overall message. Symbolism is defined as the practice of representing things by means of symbols or of attributing symbolic meanings or significance to objects, events, or relationships.
The whole poem is, in essence, one giant symbol. The opening line questions, ‘Why you let him play you like a video?’ . All in all, this summarizes the entire poem. Zakon uses symbols to question a woman why she lets her boyfriend, or possibly husband, treat her the way he does.
Zakon asks why she lets him control her, ultimately stating he has the remote control to her life. She says that he ‘Change your channels because he can’t stand your show’, meaning he tells her how to act when he does not like her attitude. The line ‘Hypnotize you until the screen turns blue’, representing the man putting the woman into a trance so to speak, so she says exactly what he wants her to say, and does exactly what he wants her to do. However, when Zakon states ‘But you need to pause you and rewind you’, she wants the woman to look at her life before she met the man. Zakon tells the woman to look back to when she gave the man the remote control to her life, and how she could have prevented it. She then makes the reference to ‘fast forward your life’, and tells the woman how things will be the same as they are today, and the woman will still hurt inside and the man will still control her life.
‘Reset you’ is one of the strongest lines in the poem, informing the woman to reset her life and take back control. Zakon then tells the woman to ‘push play’, and start her life anew. The theme is very important in a poem, because it is the implicit or recurrent idea throughout the writing. The theme in ‘Remote Control’ is how not only the man in the poem controls the woman’s life, but how it happens all over the world everyday. Many women suffer day in and day out, whether it is because they are afraid of what will happen if they do not let their man control them, or if it is because they are too insecure to change.
When men try to control women, they are demonstrating their own weakness in this regard. In other words, the implicit assumption is that men are too weak to control themselves. When a man cannot control himself, he turns to other options, most of the time the female in his relationship. In conclusion, almost no poem is complete without the use of symbolism. Symbols are often used to take the poem to a higher level. Furthermore, the theme of a poem is equally important.
The theme lays out the meaning or message of the writing. The message sent in ‘Remote Control’ is a very strong one, and should not be overlooked. Too often does this happen in our world today, and too often can it be helped but is not.