Havishams moods vary in extremes. Some days she stays in her bed and scream in denial over what has happened to her. Other times she is sad and furious of her broken life. In the first line we see these mood changes. ‘beloved sweetheart bastard’, showing she still thinks she loves him while at the same time hating him. She wishes to have a ‘male corpse’ with which to take a ‘long slow honeymoon’. Though there are suggestions of violence throughout the poem we cannot be sure what she wants to do with her ‘male corpse’. But as she stabs her wedding cake in fury we can see she is a violent, angry women who hates her old lover. She can not move on or rebuild her life from the day when her chances of escaping spinsterhood were broken.
When she looks at herself in the mirror she can’t recognise herself. She asks ‘who did this?’. Though she seems uncertain of herself many pronouns are used in this section ‘myself, me’.
Sometimes her love for him comes back ‘some nights better, the lost body over me’. But then her hatred and anger returns and ‘suddenly I bite awake’
At the end we are told about how her life is ruined; ‘don’t think its only the heart that b-breaks’ Not only has her heart been broken by this man, but her entire life and self has been destroyed. It is the end of a dark and violent poem.
In contrast is Kid, a poem by Simon Armitage. It is based on the thoughts and feelings of Robin after Batman has left him. Though it also deals with rejection and abandonment, it is in a much more lighter and happier tone than Havisham. Robin begins with alliteration, ‘batman, bigshot’. This is memorable and sticks in your mind throughout the rest of the poem. We are also shown the different styles of speech between Robin and Batman. Batman uses very fancy nautical speech ‘leeward, blue yonder’, while Robin is more local and has a simpler manner of speaking ‘ditched me in the gutter’.
When Batman left Robin behind we can understand his shock and sadness, but we are then told that it was a good thing, that Robin has now ‘turned the corner’. Now Robin is getting his own back on Batman. He is telling the truth about the Batman years and telling the world about Batman’s exploits. When people thought that Batman was ‘like father, elder brother’ to Robin. Robin ‘sacked it, blown the cover, let the cat out’. These are all ways of saying that now Robin has told the truth about Batman. Batman has an affair with a married women and when he took her out he put the car bill on expenses.
Though Robin was Batman’s shadow for so many years he has now grown up and has overtaken Batman. Though batman was famous now he has nothing. Without Robin Batman can do nothing. He can't look after himself ‘next to nothing in the walk in larder’, and has nothing to do anymore ‘punching the palm of your hand all winter’.
Robin has now grown past Batman and has much more of his life to look forward to. As Robin says ‘you baby, now I’m the real boy wonder’.
Another poem dealing with loss is Ben Jonsons, On my first sonne. It is about the first born son of Ben Jonson who died when he was seven. Ben Jonson is a very religious person, and this poem shows his feelings and his religious beliefs. A popular religious thought of the time which Jonson shared in was that his sons death was a punishment for Jonson wanting too much out of his son. Jonson loved his son too much and forgot that he was only a gift from god. To punish Jonson for this his son was taken away.
The first line, ‘thou child of my right hand’, is referring to Jonsons son. He was Benjamin which means son of Ben Jonson. In Hebrew that means ‘son of my right hand’. This is very important as Jesus sits on God’s right hand. The right side has more value than the left. In the first line Jonson also calls his son his ‘joy’. This means that his son was a god given blessing for the time he was on earth.
Jonson justifies his sons death by saying it had to happen as he was too proud of his son. Jonson believes in predestination (that your life is decided for you and you cannot change your life path), and this is shown when he says ‘exacted by fate on the just day’. He believes that his son would always have died on that day due to gods plan for him.
In the middle of the poem Jonson is overcome with sadness ‘o, could I loose all father now?’this grief seems out of sorts for him though it is a slight lapse before he regains his self-control. He asks why he would be angry at his sons death, when his son is in heaven, a place all men wish to be. Instead of being sad Jonson should envy his son for not knowing sin before he died. He escaped death and growing old and hate and all the bad things by dying young.
Now his son can rest in peace with a headstone saying that he was Jonsons greatest work and best piece of poetry.
This poem varies between feelings of sadness at his son’s death and happiness that his son is now safe in heaven and will be there for ever.
The last poem I am going to look at is The laboratory by Robert Browning. It is about a woman who is wanting to poison her lover’s mistress. Though this poem was written in Victorian times it is very against Victorian morals. It is talking about violence and murderous hate as thought by a woman. Victorians thought women should be gentle, meek and caring. They were viewed as very dainty and not connected with violence or any strong emotions. This poem, with its hateful murdering female, goes against all these views.
The poem is written as a woman is speaking to the apothecary. An apothecary was a old type of chemist, they could mix medicines and remedies. In this poem the apothecary is mixing a poison for the women, so she can kill her lover and his mistress.
The poem begins by describing the place where the apothecary is mixing the poison. It is described as a ‘devils smithy’. As devils are evil we can conclude that nothing good is happening in this place. And indeed nothing good is happening, a poison is being made. She asks about the poison ‘which is the poison to poison her prithee?’ This repetition ‘poison to poison’ is memorable so will stay in your head after you have read the poem.
The lady decries what she thinks everyone is doing to her. Her lover and his mistress are laughing at her and whispering about her behind her back. They all think she has gone to church to pray for the future of her and her lover together while infact she has come to the apothacarys to get her revenge. She deals with loss in a very different way from Havisham. She has managed to do something about her hate, even if it means killing people. Havisham has never moved on so had gone slightly mad. There are lots of pronouns ‘he,her,they,I’, which is very similar to Havisham. In this poem we are never given the names of the people involved so we have to guess or remain in the dark.
In the poem she shows great interest in what is happening ‘you call it a gum?’ ‘Is that poison too?’ This seem at odds with what she should be acting, but this poem is all about acting unlike the norms. When she should be silent and thinking she is curious and wants to know everything that is happening.
When she discovers that many of the bottles around her are poisons she becomes excited and imagines killing many people. Anyone who has crossed or rivalled her she wishes dead.
The lady then refers back to her rival in love. Describes how last night she tried to kill her by looking at her for a certain time, but it did not work. She is happy that this poison will work when her own ideas haven’t. she wants the death to be painful and slow. She wishes her rivals face to become ugly, so her lover will always remember his mistresses ugly dying face instead of the beautiful face she had before.
Once it is done the lady becomes even more happy and can’t wait to go into court, where before she did not wish to go. As she leaves she flirts with the apothecary ‘you may kiss me old man on our mouth if you will’ This is not the usual method of parting from a lady of court and yet again goes against the idea of normal, as the rest of the poem does.
Lucy King
