How to Write About Poetry

• 1. Who is the speaker? What kind of person is the speaker?

  a woman who wants her lover to remain with her instead of going off to work

  She has a confident spirit and a quick mind; she values love above all else.

• 2. Is there an identifiable audience for the speaker? What can we know about it (her, him, or them)?

  her lover who is a businessman (probably unmarried)

• 3. What is the occasion?

  The lover is preparing to depart for work.

• 4. What is the setting in time (hour, season, century, and so on)?

  It is the morning after the night they have spent together.

• 5. What is the setting place (indoors or out, city or country, land or sea, region, nation, hemisphere)?

  They are both in the beloved’s bedroom.

• 6. What is the central purpose of the poem?

  The beloved is trying to persuade her lover not to leave her for work.

• 7. State the central idea or theme of the poem in a sentence.

  A woman in a romantic love affair expects her beloved to place her above all other concerns.

• 8. What is the tone of the poem? How is it achieved?

  The tone ranges from the playfully seductive (stanza 1) to the unabashedly romantic (stanza 2) to the bluntly accusatory.

• 9.

  • a. Outline the poem so as to show its structure and development, or

    Stanza 1: the argument that he should not leave just because the day has dawned.

    Stanza 2: the argument that he should not leave for fear of their love being exposed.

    Stanza 3: the argument that he should not betray their love by serving a second mistress: business

  • b. Summarize the events of the poem.

• 10. Paraphrase the poem.

  So what if it is daylight? Is that the reason you want to leave me? Why should we leave this bed because it is light; did we go to bed because it was dark? If love brought us to bed despite the night, it should keep us here despite the day.

  The sun cannot speak even if it can see us. However, even if it could speak and told that I prefer to stay in bed with you, my love, I would not be ashamed of anything it could say.

  Is work the reason you want to leave me? That is the worst affliction that any love could suffer. Love can allow paupers, villains, and liars, but it will not tolerate a businessman. (Or, paupers, villain, and liars can submit to love, but businessmen cannot.) A man who would try to serve a mistress and a business, is as wrong as a man who would try to keep a wife and a mistress.

• 11. Discuss the diction of the poem. Point out words that are particularly well chosen and explain why.

• 12. Discuss the imagery of the poem. What kinds of imagery are used? Is there a structure of imagery?

• 13. Point out examples of metaphor, simile, personification, and metonymy, and explain their appropriateness.

• 14. Point out and explain any symbols. If the poem is allegorical, explain the allegory.

• 15. Point out and explain examples of paradox, overstatement, understatement, and irony. What is their function?

• 16. Point out and explain any allusions. What is their function?

• 17. Point out significant examples of sound repetition and explain their funciton.

• 18.

  • a. What is the meter of the poem?
  • b. Copy the poem and mark its scansion.

• 19. Discuss the adaptation of sound to sense

• 20. Describe the form or pattern of the poem.

• 21. Criticize and evaluate the poem.