Lynes, Jeanette2014-01-212014-01-212013-082013-10-09August 201http://hdl.handle.net/10388/ETD-2013-08-1184This thesis is comprised of thirty-three poems which I have written over the last year. All are lyrical and most are written in free verse, although there are a few traditional forms as well. The poems treat a range of topics and have been arranged accordingly under four broad categories: The Social, The Spiritual, The Natural, and Poetics. These four categories represent the main themes explored in the collection and serve to unify the poems according to topic. However, nearly every poem echoes, either in imagery or in ideas, the dominant themes from one or more of the three categories to which it does not belong, and these linkages are as integral to the overall structure of the work as its divisions. Titled “Everything is an Argument,” this thesis explores the emotional and intellectual stances we take in response to our experiences and surroundings. At the same time, it seeks to reflect that the boundaries between our critical categories are permeable, and that the way we understand the world in one respect is intrinsically linked to the way we encounter it in other areas. Furthermore, what the things are that we encounter are as fluid as our understanding of them, and while our labels are useful, even important in certain ways, they need not be absolutely delimiting.engPoetryArgumentNatureCommunitySpiritPoeticstext