The Many Poetic Legs of Nikki Giovanni’s “Allowables” Michael Clyde Craddock Jr College

Poetry has many legs that take readers places and forces them to see things in different perspectives. Nikki Giovanni’s poem “Allowables” articulates subliminal meanings that revolve around the death of a spider. This poem illustrates someone admitting to having killed a spider out of fear and then reflecting on their actions. Nikki Giovanni’s “Allowables” poetically develops the unequivocal theme that humans should be kind and not harm any living thing through the demonstration of various literary elements.

The speaker/narrator of “Allowables” is an anonymous entity using first-person narration to establish a personable, yet relatable connection with audiences. The speaker incorporates repetition of the word “I” by using this pronoun on six separate occasions throughout this 16-line poem. Audiences can assume that a human, either male or female, is the voice of the poem. The forthright first line of the poem, “I killed a spider” (1) evokes a confessional voice of the story. Audiences reading the poem’s first line can make the assumption that the speaker has important information to share surrounding the death of this spider. By admitting the wrong violent act, the speaker can now have peace with their decisions and no longer...