Behind Me-dips Eternity -

Question 1

Key themes

Answer 1

Life death and time

Question 2

Behind me dips eternity/before me immortality

Answer 2

Speaker has left earth and is maybe travelling toward heaven . These lines open up the ideas of going beyond geological time (contrasts with thr bible)

Question 3

Myself the term between

Answer 3

Speaker is caught between the two (the ‘term’ is still time orientated language). Highlights insignificance of speaker in comparison to immortality and eternity

Question 4

Death but the drift of eastern grey

Answer 4

Death has a gentle nature (drift is not a harsh sounding word) it is a subtle state

Question 5

Dissolving into dawn away

Answer 5

Paradoxical like ‘last onset’ in fly buzz. - death is a new beginning

Question 6

Tis kingdoms, afterward, they say

Answer 6

Tone becomes satirical and religion is presented subversively. Tonal shift!! Relieved wisdom however speaker is doubtful showing they are undermining common teaching

Question 7

Whose prince is son of none

Answer 7

Allusion to immaculate conception however it’s sounding like its on the verge of being a joke. It could be alluding that this religious claim is contradictory and doesn’t make sense

Question 8

Tis miracle before me then/Tis miracle behind, between

Answer 8

In keeping with a belief of miracles by going against science.

Question 9

And maelstrom in the sky

Answer 9

Shipwreck imagery. Storm and chaos at moment of death -splitting of the soul? Could mean a final judgement where damned are left behind.

Question 10

What does the maelstrom at the end of the poem do

Answer 10

Undermines gentle image of death presented earlier I’m the poem.

Question 11

Key techniques

Answer 11

Irregular form (anomalous in canon), caesura, shipwreck analogy