In the second stanza he wanted to let everyone know that his loved one has died and he mentioned in the first line, ‘let aeroplane circle moaning overhead’ which means that he wanted everyone to join him in feeling the pain and grief he feels and that a great man had passed. In the second line he said, ‘scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead’ to acknowledge the tragic passing away of someone special in his life. Also there were inclusions of some metaphors such as ‘crepe’ – which suggests fragility of life and love, ‘dove’ – which signifies that he wants peace and ‘traffic policemen’ – which suggests that he wants order to prevail and justice be served. All these words were used to describe his feelings instead of using the direct feelings.
The third stanza is very different from the previous two because the narrator gets personal with the readers by telling them what he meant to him. For example, in the first line he said, ‘He was my North, my South, my East, and West. He started using a lot of commas which changes the rhythm of the poem. He slows down the pace at which he narrates and makes the readers focus on the pain he feels. There was a consistent repetition of ‘my’ in the stanza because the narrator gets personal and reveals how much he hurts about the passing away of his loved one. A metaphor of compass which signified that he has lost direction in life as his beloved had died. He also talks about the times of day and days of the week that emphasises how much he had lost now he is dead.
The last stanza is all about the anger and destructive character that the narrator adopts as his tone changes and he says “the stars are not wanted now: put out every one; Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun.” It signifies that he has lost his faith in romance. The last stanza emphasises finality because in the last line he said ‘nothing can ever come to any good’ meaning he has lost faith in life and love and he has nothing to work for as it does not come to any good.
THE VET
The theme of The Vet is basically the unpleasant experience associated with conceiving. It is circulated around child that witnessed the birth of a baby calf. The poet tries to paint a picture in the mind of the readers of the painful procedure involved in delivering. The poet uses an Alliteration in the last stanza on the forth line “gleaming, silver, sweet under the tongue.”
FORM AND LANGUAGE
The first stanza is the shortest stanza in the entire poem but it simply defines what the poem is all about. The narrator said ‘Would the child like to leave? It won’t be pleasant.’ It tells the reader that a child is about to witness an unpleasant scene although it does not specify it is the birth of a calf. This builds suspense and makes the readers curious to know what happens to the child.
The second stanza is the point when the child wanted to leave the cowshed and not witness the birth by saying in line four “not knowing how to leave, once I’d said I’d stay.” She shows that she did not want to be there anymore during the birth of the animal but had to stay because she already said she wanted to be there. She wanted to be perceived as an adult rather than a child. The poem contain certain phrases such as “chance of horror” which suggests that the child may be terrified of what he may see when the calf is being delivered
The third stanza is about how the Vet actually tries to deliver the calf in which the narrator portrays the horrific procedure involved in delivering. In the first and second line, the poet uses words such as “Gloved to the elbow in blood” to explain the amount of horror she felt when the Vet reached into the back of the cow to pull out the calf. Also, the poet uses the lines “her mysterious collar of muscle” which signifies the entrance of the womb through which the Vet puts his hand to bring out the calf. The poet uses a metaphor ‘cathedral’ which signifies the womb of the cow that is safe and huge. The Cathedral is a place of worship where Christians feel safe and protected from evil, therefore it makes a huge emphasises when the poet says the mother’s womb is like a cathedral meaning that the child is free from disease, evil and stress associated with life.
The poet shows the relief of the narrator in the fourth stanza because the pregnancy has reached the stage when the calf is about to come out and the disturbing part of the delivery procedure was over. The poet uses lines such as “no knife, no severing” to show that there were no surgeries performed during the delivery. The lines started getting shorter to emphasise this relief.
The narrator in line three of the stanza refers to the Vet as a Butcher by saying “no inter-uterine butchery” because he uses scalpel just as the butcher uses sharp blades to cut open animals when performing on them. The poet compares the Vet to a butcher in the verse because just as the butcher, the Vet uses a scalpel to cut open the cow and bring out the calf and the child basically cannot differentiate between a Vet and a Butcher
The last verse is all about the birth of the calf. At this stage the Vet finally brings out the calf from its mother’s womb. The poet describes the cow as a ‘brimming mother’ in the last line of the stanza comparing the female cow to a human mother. This is because when the calf is born the mother cow shows the calf a lot of love and emotion just as the human mother when they give birth to a child. This makes this particular birth more to a human birth and the calf appear more to a child.
