Gifts

The gift symbolizes sacrifice without expecting anything in return. According to “The Gift Outright,” the American identity is rooted in selfless love, which is embodied in the gift the earliest Americans made of themselves to their country. The poem takes its title from that “outright” (12) gift and treats it as the essence of the nation’s birth. In line 13, the speaker calls the Revolutionary War the “deed of gift” (13), a legal term meaning more than “the action of giving." Rather, it is a legal promise to give or donate without expectation of return. The first Americans formalized the legal transfer of themselves through this war. However, the poem does not suggest they were uncompensated, since their gift generated a nation and national identity.

Massachusetts and Virginia

Massachusetts and Virginia symbolize the tensions underlying colonial America. They were two of the original thirteen colonies, existing in the...