Throughout the poem Slough, there is a tone of cynical humour. The poet has strong feelings about housing conditions, but doesn’t really want Slough to be bombed – ‘come friendly bombs’. Perhaps the poet is using ‘friendly bombs’ as a metaphor, for government officials who might come and sort out the housing problems. At times the poet adopts a superior tone – ‘spare the bald young clerks’, ‘it’s not their fault, they do not know’. In the first and final verses, the poet adopts an environmentalist tone that might mean he feels the cramped housing is suffocating the earth beneath and if it were destroyed by bombs the earth could breathe again – ‘the earth exhales’.
There is also a cynical tone to be found in parts of No More Hiroshimas – ‘Here atomic peace is geared towards the tourist trade’. However, in contrast to the poem Slough, the tone changes as we move through the poem. Initially the tone is one of hesitation and then amazement – ‘It might be anywhere’. The poet was obviously expecting a scene of devastation or respectful remembrance. The description of the city centre conveys a feeling of a busy but empty city centre – ‘Long, wide empty official boulevard’, ‘the corridors deserted’, ‘the tidy waste’. In the final four stanzas of the poem, the tone changes to sorrow and respect – ‘The ones that made me weep’, ‘They are the memorials we need’.
The poem Slough uses negative imagery throughout the poem. Repeating the word tinned in the second verse, conveys the idea that the people in Slough are eating artificial food and have consequently become artificial themselves. This is supported in verse 9 by the use of words to convey feeling of artificiality – ‘frizz out peroxide hair, and dry it in synthetic air’. In verses six to nine the poet paints a picture of innocent but useless young men, conveying the idea that if these men are the future of Slough, then Slough has no future – ‘Daren’t look up and see the stars, but belch instead’. Perhaps the poet feels that Slough has no future, it may as well be bombed.
In contrast to Slough the imagery changes during No More Hiroshimas. In the first five verses, the imagery is very negative - as if the poet is disappointed. Nouns are given weak adjectives – ‘flimsy department store’, ’peeling concrete’. Words associated with emptiness are used in the first four stanzas to emphasise the poet’s point of view. A city has been built over the destruction but it is lifeless and empty. In the sixth stanza, the poet comments on what he has found in Hiroshima. In the final four verses, the imagery centres on death, but this is somehow comforting to the poet and reader. He is now re-assured that people have not forgotten the dead – ‘They are the memorials we need’.
Slough is written as a rhyming poem in verses of four lines. The short rhyming style supports the cynical humour of the poem.
In contrast, No More Hiroshimas, is written in free verse, which is perhaps more suited to the mood of this poem.
Both these poems wish to convey a message to the reader. In Slough, the poet has no hopes for the future of the town and feels that a completely new start is necessary, in No More Hiroshimas, the message is more of a warning. If we forget what happened when the bomb fell on Hiroshima, it might happen again. The poet uses assonance in the final two lines of the poem to stress the message-
‘Remember only these
They are the memorials we need’
