The Light Gatherer

Question 1

What is the main conceit of The Light Gatherer?

Answer 1

A beautiful celebration of a baby who brings light to her mother’s life.

Question 2

What are the key language methods in the poem?

Answer 2

• Motifs of light
• Fairytale iconography
• Ethereal imagery
• water imagery
• religious imagery

Question 3

What are the key structural methods in the poem?

Answer 3

-Internal rhyme
-9 tercets with no regular rhyme scheme
-caesura ‘Light Gatherer.’ her life has been changed so suddenly and significantly becuase of her child

Question 4

What quotes show the method of: fairytale iconography?

Answer 4

‘you fell from a star’

Question 5

What quotes show the method of: motifs of light?

Answer 5

‘the crown of your bowed head spotlit’
‘candlesworth under the skin’

Question 6

What quotes show the method of: ethereal imagery?

Answer 6

‘ears’ and ‘tears’
‘warm pearls’
‘cupped palms’

Question 7

What quotes show the method of: water imagery?

Answer 7

‘when language came, it glittered like a river, silver, clever with fish’

Question 8

What quotes show the method of: religious imagery?

Answer 8

‘your kissed feet’
‘I knelt watching’