“Imagine the drip of it, the small splash, echo in a tin mug,” This quote contains onomatopoeia to make the reader think of the sound water makes when it splashes. The poet talks of how water leaves an echo when it splashes. The word echo could be said to be referring to water in this community and how like an “echo” it slowly disappears. Furthermore this quote also involves the reader with the poem as it asks them to imagine the drip of water. This tone of voice I believe has been used to make us realise how valuable water is to this community.
In stanza two it says” the voice of a kindly god” reveals that this community may have a lack of faith in god as the “g” in God is not a capital. It could be suggested that this community has a lack of faith in God because they rarely have water to drink. However this is very ironic because the poem talks of a rush of fortune (help from god) which results in them having water.
In the third stanza it says “sometimes, the sudden rush of fortune. The municipal pipe bursts, silver crashes to the ground”. From this quote it is clear that the poet is comparing this “sudden fortune” to the “echo” and how gradually this “fortune” will disappear. That is why everyone in the community rushes outside with pots and pans to contain the water because they know this “fortune” will soon be gone. It is further made evident that the water will soon be gone as the last line of this stanza says “frantic hands”. Before this line the poem talks of how everyman women and child is outside rushing to collect the water. When imagining this I see people happy and working together to gather the water. However as the stanza ends with “frantic hands” this may not be the case. Frantic is a very aggressive word and is associated with violence and anger. It could be said that these people are actually fighting over the water. To fight over water is another sign of how important it is to these people.
Furthermore the poet talks of the importance of water by using silver as a metaphor for it. It is believed that because she uses silver instead of water she is trying to involve the reader so that they understand what would happen in their community if something of value started to crash to the floor. It is clear she understands most people take water for granted so she had to use something we would care about so that we understand why they are so happy to have water. In addition to this silver used to be thrown to the poor, I believe she is reminiscing on these times and is comparing this to how the pipe which belongs to the rich is giving them water (silver).
The last stanza of “Blessing”, even though separated from the third is connected with the conjunction “and”. This separation that is still connected maybe representing the adults and the children. The adults who are trying to collect the water are very serious and want to collect as much as possible. This is not how the children act as they are enjoying this moment. This is evident because the poet refers to this as the highlight of their day and how it’s “polished to perfection”.
The poems structure in stanza three is also related to water as the stanza is structured as water flowing. This becomes apparent after the water has burst from the “municipal pipe”. After this the poem is written in a list. This list is suggested to be signifying the water and how it is flowing.
