may Flashcards
form
13 line sonnet, implies that something is missing. truncated sonnet
volta followed by 5 rather than 6 lines
‘i cannot tell you how it was’
uncertainty and ambiguous nature of ‘it’
direct adress= intimacy and conversational tone= confession
‘it came to pass on
upon a bright snd sunny day’
-pathetic fallacy used to emphasise joyousness
‘when may was young, ah, pleasent may!
association of may with youth, introduced may as a fleeting metaphor for the transcience of time and youth/ innocence
-exclamation shows reminiscence and longing for the serenity of may
‘as yet the poppies were not born
-description of a liminal space beween life and death occurs frequently in this stanza (not born and not hatched)
-this stage has an association with vunerability and sexual innocence but also a longing for maternity and familial bond
metre
iambic tetrameter
rhyme scheme
consistent
cesura ‘ah, pleasent may’ effect
reflective
pathetic fallacy effect
may- happiness, love, sexuality, fertility
old, cold and gray- lost love, melancholy
repetition of ‘passed away’ effect
euphamism for death and enforces idea of transcience of life
shows fleetingness of earthly love
fleeting metaphor of may significance/ matapghor of seasons
metaphor for transcience of youth/innocence
‘blades of tender corn’
suggestion of fragility of innocence and unawareness of danger of the world (tenderness of feelings in the intesity of a relationship?)
juxtaposition between blades and tender points to unawareness of danger in innocence (metaphor of unawarenessn of the hurt that comes with relationships)
‘last egg had not hatched as yet,
nor anybird foregone its mate’
-continuation of liminal space between life and death
-reference to abandonment from her ‘mate’
‘it did but pass
it passed away with sunny may’
repetition of passed away becomes a euphamism for death and enforces the idea of transcience of life
comparative to ‘came to pass’, something has ended
-somleminity contrast with lightness of first stanza
‘i cannot tell you how it was’
repetition of first line but this time indicating Volta
anaphora emphasises uncertainty
-somleminity contrast with lightness of first stanza
‘old cold an gray’
pathetic phallacy used again but to display misery
idea of losing someone in a state of fertility, led to unfufilment in age of her life (no maternity, no partner?)
significance of Volta
switch in tone, passing of may and longing for it back
‘not born’ ‘not hatched’ significance
idea of liminal space between life and death- connotes innocence and vulnerability/sexual innocence
also connotes longing for maternity and familial bond
significance of natural imagrey in firt octave
-idea of fertility and rebirth (before her ‘mate leaves her and she rejects this idea of love and fertility)
poppies significance
stypical of pre-raphelite painting, but there is bleakness to poppy feilds showing lack of longevity to this love)
rhyming triplet
However its sad ambiguity creates a sense of the blues, and that it was over too soon
significance of context of time written
written 1855, year after her engangement with james collinson was called off
The Title
Title associated with contents of the poem
Indicator of new life/ hope/ birth/ re-birth
Season of spring; implications of the natural woman, fertility
