Another poem with religious iconography is “Brothers”, in which Carol Ann Duffy describes her four siblings, on of which is illustrated as “an alter boy” I believe she is trying to tell the reader that they lived solitary lives and didn’t have a very active social live inside or outside the family. This is because of the portrayal of her other brothers, “a boy practising scales”, “a boy playing tennis with a wall” and “a baby crying”. If you look at these collectively you can see that these are quite lonesome activities and events, none of them involve other people.
My final example of religious connotations is in “Prayer”, most of the poem is in iambic pentameter and I believe that this is trying to show that religion can bring order in to a hectic lifestyle. The poem is about loosing faith but still having hope and a type of sub-conscious faith in your mind. The rhythmic structure along with the religious connotations throughout the poem give hope to reader by allowing us to believe that the poet has suffered the same as you and has got through their experiences and are here to remember them.
Carol Ann Duffy also uses the effect of the senses on the reader, my first example of this is in “Litany”; the poet uses taste to relieve the memory of being disciplined. “The taste of soap” is quite a strong image that, unfortunately, most people can remember from being in the shower or having a wash! The use of senses gives the reader the chance to really imagine themselves in the poet’s shoes and gives the poem a more realistic picture.
In “Brothers”, Carol Ann Duffy uses another sense; hearing to emphasis her mothers repetitive comments about children and her wishes to be a grandmother but then finding out that Duffy was a lesbian. I believe that the phase “I hear her life in the words” obviously this is a turning point in Duffy’s life; telling your mother your gay isn’t the easiest thing in the world! And the use of senses here shows how much this experience really did stand out.
These two examples are quite obvious but the final one is a little more subtle. It is again in Litany and is synaesthesia, it mixes more than one sense, Duffy explains how a butterfly moves into her hands, “a butterfly stammered into my curious hands” here the two senses being used are touch, the butterfly crawling onto her hands and voice in the word stammering it is a piece of onomatopoeia. Synaesthesing allows the audience to imagine one thing, in this case someone stammering and put it into another situation, a butterfly crawling and flapping its wings. This gives the all important realistic picture.
It is important for a poet to create a convincing image of the situation being represented and a common way any poet does this is by strong visual imagery, it is the easiest sense for someone to imagine. In “Stafford Afternoons” Carol Ann Duffy describes a rather risqué image of a man in the woods! The obvious meaning of the “living, purple root in his hand” is his penis and this is rather an intense image for a young girl just trying to be a little bit adventurous.
Another strong created by Duffy is in “The captain of the 1964 Top of the Form Team” when she describes the characters lips after a very long kiss, “like Mick, my lips numb as a two-hour snog”, ‘Mick’ is Mick Jagger the famous rock star and his infamous lips! This is a very clear picture for anyone who know what Mick looks like and so again the reader can understand the situation.
Duffy also looks at history repeating itself, in “Prayer” Duffy uses a very general terminology for describing the timing, “Some days” gives the impression that the sad times have happened before but things got better and they will get better again, this gives faith to the reader.
This could also be seen in “Brothers” when Duffy describes her brothers’ “who share an older face” I thing this gives a warmer feel to the poem as it reflects a loving, family feel.
Shakespeare once described life as a play and Duffy does this in a couple of her poems; “Brothers” and “Litany”. In “Brothers” Duffy describes a play that she and her siblings were in and a line that was said by one of them. This could be seen a literal play and an actual line or the ‘play of life’ and maybe a line her mother said.
My second example isn’t a play but “The soundtrack” the literal meaning is the litany’s read in church and how much they were repeated but again it could be seen as the soundtrack to life.
On a more morbid note, Carol Ann Duffy also looks at death and endings. In “Brothers” Duffy refers to “a box” and her brothers will “shoulder it” we can make the assumption that the box is actually a coffin and maybe even her mothers. This reference to death s important because as kids, children don’t believe death will ever happen to them and they may not even comprehend the full meaning of it and this poem sees Duffy come to terms with the end of life, an important step in growing up.
The second reference is to the end of the world, in “Prayer” she writes four of the shipping forecast areas, this has a soporific effect but she chooses a very important area and this contrasts against the happy sleepy mood; “Finisterre” means the end of the world and this is actually quite a strange end to the poem.
In conclusion Duffy uses various ways to get through her life but the most important one is the actual writing of her poems, they allow her to convey her feelings through imagery and emotive language.
