Visiting hour Flashcards
What are the two common themes throughout the poem?
Facing death and isolation
“The hospital smell combs my nostrils.”
Sensory image. Helps to put the reader in McCaigs shoes
“Green and yellow corridors.”
Word choice gives the quote a sickly feeling due connotations of being in a hospital
“What seems a corpse is trundled into a lift and vanishes heavenward”
Enjambment Used to emphasise the final words to follow the theme of death in the poem
“I will not feel, I will not feel.”
Shows how MacCaig is trying to suppress his emotions
“Not until I have to.”
Shows MacCaig’s struggle to control his emotions
“Ward 7.”
Shows MacCaig’s hesitation to enter to see his dying relative shows his fear of seeing them
“ A withered hand
trembles on its stalk.”
Metaphor comparing the arm to a stalk that’s wasting away and the hand to a leaf
