This complies with a theory first introduced in 1969, by a woman named Elisabeth Kübler-Ross, and is known as “The Kübler-Ross Model”, or “The Five Stages of Grief”. It states that the five stages of grief are: Denial, anger, bargaining, depression and acceptance, known by the acronym “DABDA”. The fact that the poet in this case is savouring the delusion that there has been no change is an example of denial. It may simply be that Auden is going through the ordinary stages of losing somebody.
Whilst telling the reader to perform these actions, the poet uses imperatives or modal verbs to do so. “Stop all the clocks… Prevent the dog… Silence the pianos…” These harsh sounding commands evoke how the poet is focused on his intent of eliminating all distractions, such as clocks ticking, telephones ringing, dogs barking and pianos playing, so that he can mourn all he wants and convince himself that there has been no change in his life.
These modal verbs are very strict and forbidding, which changes on line four, “Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come”. The verb pattern used with “let” is one used with relatively few verbs, others include “help” and “make”. The verb pattern consists of the verb, the object and the base form (infinitive without “to”). This pattern changes the tone of the piece and the reader can almost hear the voice of the poet, as the verb is much more allowing and less aggressive in its meaning, which could be consistent with the Kübler-Ross model, as the poet is moving away from the stage of denial and is ever progressing towards the final stage of acceptance.
Continuing from ideas explored in the first stanza, the second stanza further develops the idea of “public mourning”. The poet has been so deeply affected by the personal loss that he feels the entire world should share in his grief. The first line, “Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead” creates vivid imagery using the present form of the verb “moaning”, which is onomatopoeic. The reader can visualise the grandeur of the sight of aeroplanes flying to mark the death of this person, as it is so essential for the world to share the experience. The “moaning” could also be linked with the events occurring at the funeral service; the sadness and lamenting of the mourners.
The aeroplanes mentioned on line 5, on the next line are, “Scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead”. The verb “scribbling” may have been used intentionally to differ from normally writing it to “scribbling” on the sky, possibly because the people are so distraught they cannot control themselves enough to write neatly. When written in the sky, it is available for everyone to see the distressing news. Capitalisation of the words “He Is Dead” could be significant in indicating that the person was of similar authority to a deity.
More symbolism for the elaborate funeral procession include “…crepe bows round the white necks of the public doves/Let the traffic policemen wear black cotton gloves”. These are not generally apparent at a funeral; however in this instance, incorporating them into the funeral procession emphasises the poet’s requirement for public mourning. The traffic policemen would not normally be invited to the funeral, or even take any notice of the passing, but this reinforces how tragic his death is to the world.
These couple of lines also illustrate the rhyme scheme used throughout the poem, which is AABB. This rhyme scheme creates a steady beat, a rhythm which sets the poem’s pace quite slow, appropriate for the depressing and melancholy mood that the poet wants the reader to experience. The rhythm as a result of the rhyme could also be symbolism for the “muffled drum” used during the funeral procession as a funeral march beat, which allows the reader to hear the sounds themselves and develop a unity with the poet and his emotions.
The third stanza conveys how intimate the relationship between the poet and the deceased. In this stanza, the poet uses hyperbole combined with metaphors to portray exactly how much the person meant to him. “He was my North, my South, my East and West”. The four cardinal points total sum to everything, which means that the deceased was the poet’s entire world and that he meant everything to him in life. Furthermore, the four cardinal points on the compass could represent the person who has died as being a moral compass upon which the poet could have led his life, so he has a also lost his guidance through his journey.
Throughout this stanza, possessive nouns such as “my” and personal pronouns such as “I” are frequently used. This reiterates the point that the deceased person was extremely person to the poet, and he almost belonged to him. The personal pronouns and possessive nouns could also suggest that the poet does not want anybody else to have access to the deceased and he feels his death is the equivalent of him being taken away. Also, the last line, “I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong” infers that the love between the poet and the deceased was so strong that the couple became engulfed in its power and so forgot about the real world and how, as everything does, it would eventually come to an end.
Finally for this stanza, the poet for the first time is beginning to use past tense, which suggests that he is nearing the final stage of the Kübler-Ross model of acceptance, and is finally comprehending the fact that his soul mate is gone forever. “He was my North”. This could also show how the poet feels lost without his lover and feels he has no direction in life. This is explored in greater detail in the following stanza.
Concluding the poem, the final verse affirms how hopeless the poem is and terminates the use of commanding (modal) verbs. The poet attempts to convey the idea of a purposeless life without his deceased love one. Similar to the first stanza, the readers are informed to perform a set of impossible tasks, so consequently the poet can mourn. “The stars are not wanted now: put out every one/Pack up the moon and dismantle the sun/Pour away the ocean and sweep up the wood.” These lines express the despair and depression of the poet, the second to last stage of the Kübler-Ross model, as a world without the stars or sun would cause everything to become void, including life. The third line of the last stanza echoes the sentiment of the previous line as the repeated use of hyperbolic metaphors are intended to symbolise the aimlessness of the poet due to his loss. Bye doing this, the poet displays how meaningless his life is without his lover and the loss of oceans and trees is the equivalent loss for the Earth.
The final line of the poem really sums up the poet’s feelings in the stage of depression. “For nothing now can ever come to any good.” The death of the man has caused such extreme devastation for the poet that he can no longer see any good in the world and has resorted to extreme pessimism. This emphasise the melancholy tone present throughout the entire poem, along with the finality of live and purpose, similar to the death of his lover.
The main ratiocination of this poem of this poem is that it uses various techniques to establish a connection between pet and reader so the reader can easily empathise with the poet in his time of grieving. Not only does the reader feel the pain that the poet is going through from his vivid imagery, but he can respect him for the difficult period of life he is going through. In my opinion, loss affects everyone differently and everybody has experiences of loss, no matter how small of big the loss was, or how much devastation it caused. I think this poem is very successful in conveying how an extremely big loss can affect a person, especially informing people who haven’t experienced loss on such a large scale themselves. Particularly as W. H. Auden hadn’t actually lost anyone himself, he is evidently extremely intelligent for being capable of pulling off such a mammoth task.
