Edwin Morgan's 'in the snack bar'
             Edwin Morgan's poem 'In the snack bar' vividly describes an experience using excellent imagery and word-choice. Through the use of such devices Morgan delivers two main themes to the reader of this poem. The first theme is the general publics fear of the unknown, the second the indomitability of the human spirit.
             'In the snack bar' is a poem about an experience shared between the poet Morgan and a physically disabled and disfigured old man. The journey though small and rather insignificant to any normal person (a simple journey to and from the bathroom in a snack bar) is brought to life by Morgan's use of imagery and word-choice. The poet reveals the problems the old man faces with such small journeys and in the end finds him-self empathising with the old mans plight.
             On first reading the poem I was struck by the use of imagery the poet employs to build a portrait of the old man. This use of such imagery provides a very vivid picture which helps to highlight one of the poems main themes and the experience the poet went through. We are told early on in the poem that the old man has a hump which forces his head down and then that he is also blind and half paralysed. This in itself provides the reader with a rather helpless image of the old man. To contrast this helpless image Morgan uses imagery to bring to life the idea of a monstrous character. He writes;
             "He stands in his stained beltless gabardine
             like a monstrous animal caught in a tent".
             When the two men make it to the toilet Morgan describes the old mans reflection as 'brooding', a reflection which 'darkens the mirror'. The image of the monster continues further in the poem when the poet poses the question of the old man
             "does he know how frightening he is in his strangeness"
             ...