Gavin+and+Greg+C

In the poem the __The Knight,__ Adrienne Rich portrays the two sides of a knight in his armor, the shining and heroic exterior and the ragged tortured interior. In the second stanza she conveys these images with the line "set in a metal mask, betraying rags and tatters that cling to the flesh beneath and wear his nerves to ribbons under the radiant casque". By stating this, she expresses her thoughts on the dual persona projected by knight. The "radiant casque" or the shining armor is what people except to see, straight from the fairy tales. However they do not see what is underneath, the "rags and tatters", which is the reality of life. This exemplifies the fact that life is a duality, full of what people think they perceive of themselves and others, and the actual reality of what is truly there. People are blinded in their perceptions of others, even though inside everyone has the same doubts and frayed nerves. A very accurate example of this is displayed in the book __Friday Night Lights__, with the football players representing the the Knight in his shining armor.

In the town of Odessa, Texas football is King and the players are its Knights. The book __Friday Night Lights__ chronicles the story of a particular team that holds the hopes of the town. Even though the players are like Knights for the town, they have a side beneath the "shining armor". Mike Winchell is a perfect example of this as a shining quarterback, and yet he has little faith in himself. H.G. Bissinger is quoted saying, "There had always been something inward and painfully shy about Mike" (75). Mike, even after his success in sports still had doubts about himself and was not very confident. Even when wearing the shining armor of the Permian Panther's football uniform, he was still the same underneath the it. Mike is exactly the same as the knight in Adrienne Rich's poem. He wears the uniform and is perceived as a hero by the town of Odessa, yet underneath he is always worrying about his position, his throw, and a numerous amount of non-football related subjects.