To enable a successful comparison of two things, one must be able to understand all aspects of the articles in question. Many forms of literature are easily comparable due to the very nature of an author transcribing a piece of history or a thought directly onto paper; However, poetry is not one of those aforementioned forms of literature that are so easily comparable. This is because poetry itself is as emotional as it is ambiguous. In the absence of definitive rules dictating what is or is not poetry, attention to detail is essential to fully understanding the relationships between poems. Using three different poems, by different authors, and all contained within a similar category, allows for a wider range of analysis; furthermore, the marked differences, as well as the commonalities between them, become more evident when comparing more than two works by one or more authors. The poetic works in this comparison are “The Mother,” by Gwendolyn Brooks; “The Man He Killed,” by Thomas Hardy; and “Ballad of Birmingham,” by Dudley Randall. At first glance, each of these poems appears to have very little in common with each other. On the one hand, they are unique to each specific poem. On the other hand, these three pieces of poetry are similar in many ways. Analyzing each poem with respect to the theme presented, the tone communicated, the imagery used, and the rhyme scheme used, exposes the coexistence of similarities and differences between the three poems. The themes between the poems are very similar, if not identical. The speaker's floating sense of guilt is overwhelming in each of these poems. In "The Mother", the speaker is the mother herself, who has authorized the rest of the paper......s that of the speaker's internal struggles and the audience's understanding of those struggles. The rhyme scheme, although all used the same, is completely different and shows little, if any, sign of similarity. The theme is the main adhesive as to what ties these three great works together, in that the guilt and regret felt by the speaker is so immense, signaling to the audience that the poems have much in common, although, through everyone's differences. , they are unique in themselves. Works Cited Charters, Ann and Samuel B. Charters eds. Literature and its writers: an introduction to fiction, poetry and theater. 6th ed. Boston: Bedford, 2013. Print. Brooks, Gwendolyn. “The Mother.” Charters and Charters 942-943.Hardy, Thomas. “The man he killed.” Charters and Charters 1064.Randall, Dudley. “Ballad of Birmingham”. Charters and Charters 1048-1049.