The idea of an apple pie is that of a warming, homely, thing that brings people together. It is something that can be shared, which gives the sense of a family or a community. The mother was what kept them together. She was vital, and without her there’s nobody there to tell them they’re “alike”. So now they “don’t try” to “talk much”, because all they have in common is the sense of loss, and now she’s not there anymore there is no reason to try and get along.
This sense of grievance continues in “Long Distance 2”. But it concentrates more on how Harrison’s father deals with the loss, and how he denies the reality of his wife’s death. This is shown when even though Harrison’s mother was “already two years dead”, his father would still keep a routine of keeping “her slippers warming by the gas”, and continued to “renew her transport pass” along with putting “hot water bottles” on “her side” of the bed. We feel a sense of pity for Harrison’s father and his inability to accept his wife’s death. All these habits are because she is never coming back. Another image that shows us that he can’t let go of her is that he is under the delusion that he “knew” she had just “popped out to get the tea”. This would have been a routine thing for her to do; so everyday he would await the familiar sound of her key “scrape in the rusted lock” as she came back with “tea” (dinner). He would have felt this everyday, a sense of anticipation at her return, which ingrains the sense of daily loss, and shows us that he used to rely on her for food. It also shows us that he associated a certain sound with her returning home, which was a memory he would be waiting and listening out for but that he will now never hear.
Both “Bookends” and “Long Distance 2” derive from the death of the mother and how this affects both Harrison and his father, but this is where they also differ. “Bookends” shows the difference between Harrison and his father, and how they deal with her death together and how it affects their relationship directly after his mother’s death. But “Long Distance 2” concentrates much more on the effects of her death on the father two years later. He is still “raw” over the loss of his wife, and two years has done nothing to ease the pain.
The structure and rhythm of “Bookends” and “Long Distance 2” is irregular and awkward at times. I think Harrison intended this so as to emphasis the sense of her sudden death and the irregularity and instability of their lives afterwards. “Bookends” has 8 verses and 16 lines, with a continuation of rhyming couplets until verse 7. It has a simple structure, which is interrupted at the end very abruptly. Line seven summarises the whole poem without any explanation. It’s rhythm and rhyme are completely different to the rest of the poem. It is very powerful, and is directed by Harrison at his father as a statement, showing exactly how much this loss has affected him. “Your life’s all shattered into smithereens”, it has long sounds and syllables, which drag on, unlike the short abrupt and explosive monosyllables in the first 6 verses. Harrison uses vowel sounds to create a long and continuous movement along with many long “Ss” and “Ls” to make this line stand out. It continues the sense that life is never going to be the same again, that his father has no hope at patching it all together, because it’s “shattered” like shards of glass that have been smashed into tiny pieces. Like his life, it is all broken up. The last verse is a long verse, with 3 lines in it, and it is a statement of explanation for the differences between him and his father. All the other lines in the poem have 9-10 syllables, but the last one has 11 syllables, with the word “books” repeated 3 times, which is the extra thing between them, Harrison’s “books”. This is a metaphor for his education and the tension between them. It also goes back to the title, which sums up the poem.
“Long Distance 2” has a very different structure, but has a similar irregularity of rhythm in the last verse. There are 4 verses and 4 lines in each verse, and 10-11 syllables in each line, which creates more regularity than the rhythm and structure of “Bookends”. I think this is supposed to reflect the painful routine his father has to go through daily. There is one line that stands out, the first line of the 4th verse; “I believe that life ends with death, and that is all.” It is not poetic, unlike the rest of the poem, which has a comfortable and continuous rhythm made up mostly of monosyllables. It is factual and harsh, again conveying what Harrison really thinks and feels. It is no longer a rhyme; he has turned that singular line into prose, which is what makes it stand out. The verses in “Long Distance 2” are different to “Bookends”. They have more structure to them; a continuous rhyme scheme of quatrains and cross-rhyme, suggesting that although his father’s life may still be in disarray, he has found a place of stability and acceptance, albeit not happiness.
Harrison uses many poetic devices in both of these poems. Word’s such as “Bookends” are similes, and adjectives such as “shattered” and “smithereens” are onomatopoeic, whist
Harrison uses poetic devices to enhance the effect of certain words. The word “sullen” for example in “Bookends” describes the poem’s mood perfectly. Other words that connect with or express the word “sullen” include negative words such as grave, miserable and pessimistic. His use of long vowel sounds such as the “U” in sullen give the word a deep and guttural feeling, which gives it a profoundly heavy effect. This is called assonance. The double “L” continues this effect and uses the effect of consonance with other words such as “silent”. The letter “N” on the end of “sullen” gives the impression of finality, just like the death of Harrison’s mother. It is a very negative sound, and this along with the rest of the effect of the word give a very expressive sound. It describes the looks on both Harrison and his father’s faces as they are confronted by the death of his mother. “Long Distance 2” has similar words and poetic devices. The word “dead” has a abrupt finality to it. The “D” creates a heavy and dark, lifeless feel. Many of the other words in “Long Distance 2”, “bed”, “dad”, “drop” and “popped”, all share the ending of a deep “D”. The sound is blunt and short, which connects with monosyllabic sounds, and the irreversible definiteness of death. There is a very strong connection between this sound and the meaning of the poem. “Disconnected” sums up both poems, but it is used in the last verse of “Long Distance 2”, to explain that Harrison’s father is disconnected with reality; he may as well be “disconnected” or “dead” himself. He is disconnected from his wife; from real life; and from the fact that his wife is not coming back. And what is mostly presented in both poems is that father and son are also disconnected. The phone at Harrison’s parents is disconnected, and Harrison admits he is somewhat disconnected. This word has the same effect as “dead” with the double “D” at the beginning and end of the word. It has a long “N” sound in the middle, giving the word a negative quality, similar to the word “sullen” with the long “N’ sound at the end rather than in the middle of the word. You can separate the syllables in ‘dis | con | nec | ted’, giving the word a rhythm of its own. It connects with many of the other letters and sounds in the poem (consonance), and is in some ways the most powerfully expressive word in the poem.