Time’s winged chariot hurrying near…”
(Lines 21-22)
The above is the beginning of the ‘but’ section. At the time when this poem was written people were not expected to live very long and so “Time’s winged chariot” would always seem to be hurtling towards people, even if they were very young by today’s standards. The passage of time was a popular theme in poems of the 17th Century, for example, in Shakespeare’s ‘Sonnet XVIII’ he writes:
“…When eternal lines of time thou grow’st…”
(Line 11)
Here Shakespeare notes the changes in people’s appearances as they grow old; someone who was beautiful in youth grows to be unattractive with age. Marvell also uses the idea that beauty is lost as time goes by:
“Thy beauty shall no more be found;
Nor, in thy marble vault, shall sound
My echoing song: then worms shall try
That long-preserved virginity…”
(Lines 25- 28)
Marvell’s words here create quite a disturbing image: when the lady is dead the only company she will have is from the worms. The language used is oppressive as well as disturbing; what the poem is saying is that, if the lady does not lose her innocent coyness now and with this man, she will die a virgin. It is almost as if the woman is being pressurised into feeling guilty about having maintained her “…quaint honour…” (Line 29) for so long. The woman’s feelings of guilt and loneliness continue to be provoked in the next few lines:
“The graves a fine and private place,
But none, I think do there embrace.”
(Lines 31-32)
When she dies she will have all of the privacy she could ever desire but yet she will have no company and no one to love her. The man gives his ‘mistress’ an ultimatum; either she submits to him now or she dies lonely.
This poem has definite pace and rhythm. The first ‘if’ section is slower than the others, the words in the second verse sound harsher than in the other two verses and the final ‘therefore’ section has the fastest rhythm.
“Now, therefore, while the youthful hue
Sits on our skin like morning dew…
… And now like amorous birds of prey,
Rather at once our time devour,
Then languish in his slow-chapped power.”
(Lines 33-34, 38-40)
These lines suggest that whilst the lovers are still young they should devour time, ‘seize the moment’, and sleep together. All illusions of a platonic relationship fade in this section; the couple should be like “…amorous birds of prey…” instead of sharing in the “…vegetable love…” of the ‘if’ section. The couple should enjoy themselves while they still have time.
“… And tear our pleasures with rough strife,
Through the iron gates of life.
Thus, though we cannot make our sun
Stand still, yet we will make him run.”
(Lines 42-46)
These lines state that life is not always easy, the gates of life are not made of ‘gold’ but ‘iron’. Young people, like new iron, are gleaming and strong; as they grow old, however, like iron, their beauty becomes tarnished and their strength wanes. Marvell writes that even though they cannot stop the passage of time, they can use their time in a pleasurable way. In this poem, the idea of the passage of time is that it is designed to cause grief; if the lovers use their time to their own advantage then they will, in some way, have beaten time.
The man in this poem contradicts himself when referring to his ideas of love. In the first section, when referring to his “…vegetable love…” he says:
“…Nor would I love at lower rate.”
(Line 20)
This means that he would not put any pressure on her to do anything that she did not want to and he would not even try to make her because she deserves to be given love of ample quality. Conversely, in the final section of the poem Marvell writes that the couple should be like “…amorous birds of prey…” This kind of love is not dignified and it is the antithesis of what the woman was being promised in the first section. It is in this final section when the man’s sexual frustration pours out almost as anger at her previous refusal to embark on anything other than a non-physical relationship. In this poem the fury is mixed with humour so it is not particularly dark. There are some poems, however, where the anger that love can cause is much more apparent.
William Blake’s ‘The Sick Rose’ is a very short and yet disturbing poem which begins with the exclamation:
“O Rose thou art sick.”
(First line)
This is an extremely direct and thought provoking opening. The word “Rose” begins with a capital letter suggesting it is a name or title. Roses are usually seen as being blood red and the symbol of passion; they are exquisitely beautiful to look at and to smell and yet below their ornate, delicate flowers lay stems of piercing thorns. When one thinks of a sick rose one imagines something dry, brown, wilted and devoid of beauty and nonetheless still with thorns that maintain their ferocity. The fact that women, especially if they are English, are referred to as ‘roses’ suggests to me that Blake’s words are not referring to a plant. I think that the woman, to whom Blake referrers, is considered to be either physically, or, more likely due to the obviously strong emotion that the exclamation suggests, she has done something that makes her seem mentally ill. The poem continues:
“The invisible worm,
That flies in the night
In the howling storm…”
(Lines 2-4)
The worm mentioned above could be a disease which is eating away at the woman ‘Rose’ just as maggots would be eating away at the plant ‘rose’. Maggots and worms are often associated with the grave as is so in the poem I looked at earlier “To His Coy Mistress”; but, unlike in Marvell’s poem, Blake does not use direct imagery of the grave. Night time is when people are supposed to be safest, in their own beds. However, a bed in which one sleeps can just as easily be a death bed and the idea of a “howling storm” suggests pain.
The idea that ‘Rose’ was taken ill is one interpretation of the poem, although, it is not how I personally interpret it. I think that this ballad has a much darker meaning behind it than just being a poem about a woman who is dying. In my opinion, ‘Rose’ has been having an affair; the exclamations and the language used suggest strong emotion which makes me feel that this poem is written from the view point of ‘Rose’s’ partner. I myself think that Blake, a highly religious man, was using imagery of Satan, who is often referred to as a serpent or a ‘worm’, to depict the man with whom ‘Rose’ has been fraternizing. I believe that this satanic figure is described as being invisible because the woman’s partner has never seen him because he leaves or ‘flies in the night’. In my opinion the “howling storm” has a double meaning. It could describe an argument that ensues after the woman’s partner learns of her affair; or, it could be the troubled howling of a mother giving birth to the child which was conceived in sin.
“… Has found out thy bed
Of crimson joy:
And his dark secret love
Does thy life destroy.”
(Lines 5-8)
The ‘worm’ has found a way in to ‘Rose’s’ bed. Again, I think that “crimson joy” could
have two meanings. Crimson is a colour often used to illustrate passion so it could be a
bed of ‘passionate joy’, the place where the couple converged. Conversely, it could be
telling of the woman’s monthly menstrual cycle where the ‘crimson joy’ would equal the
knowledge that she is not with child; now, however, she does not have this because she
has been impregnated by an impostor. The evil, concealed passion from this intruder is
destroying her life. This is not the only poem where relationships have led to a loss of
happiness.
“We stood by a pond that winter day,
And the sun was white, as though chidden of God,
And a few leaves lay on the starving sod;
-They had fallen from an ash and were gray”
(Lines 1-4)
From the beginning of this poem, “Neutral Tones” by Thomas Hardy, you can tell the direction in which it is going. The very title is depressing. When something is ‘neutral’ it is drab and uninteresting and moods, as well as colours and sounds, can be related in different ‘tones’. You get the picture of a cold winter’s day where the sun seems scornful of God and the only things covering the dry, brown ground are grey, or ‘gray’, dead leaves. This is not a pleasant setting for the couple standing by the pond.
“Your eyes on me were as eyes that rove
Over tedious riddles of years ago…
…On which lost the more by our love”
(Lines 5-6, 8)
We can assume from this that the two people standing by the pond are in a relationship. This is a long term relationship teeming with meaningless, ‘tedious’ quarrels. These quarrels, however, have always been sorted out because the pair loved one another.
“The smile on your mouth was the deadest thing
Alive enough to have strength to die;
And a grin of bitterness swept thereby
Like an ominous bird a-wing….”
(Lines 9-12)
This, one assumes, is the end of their relationship. One of the couple, presumably a woman as this poem is written by a man, who had previously donned a false smile, has adopted a new façade of bitterness. The description of “an ominous bird a-wing” makes the reader think of a bird of prey swooping in for the kill on a helpless rodent. This description, like Marvell’s “amorous birds of prey”, is a very vivid and callous one.
“Since then, keen lessons that love deceives,
And wrings with wrong, have shaped to me
Your face, and the God-curst sun, and a tree,
And a pond edged with grayish leaves”
(13-16)
The final verse of this poem presents love as something that is selfish and deceptive. This view of love is the complete opposite of the description given in verse one of the poem “The Clod and the Pebble”.
“Love seeketh not itself to please,
Nor for itself hath any care;
But for another gives its ease,
And builds a Heaven in Hells despair.”
(Lines 1-4)
The above is the opinion of the “Clod of Clay”. It thinks that love is selfless and gives itself up freely in order that people might experience the joy that it brings. In the Clod’s optimistic opinion, love will rid the world of evil and turn it into a “Heaven in Hells despair”. In Hardy’s poem, however, love has caused nothing but feelings of bitterness which will never be forgotten.
In conclusion, love is presented by poets in many different ways. Some poets’ picture love as something that is selfless and wonderful, some depict love as something that causes more pain than joy and some, like Marvell, seem to think that love really counts for nothing if there is no passion involved. All of the poems covered in this essay do agree that love is an intense emotion that will make one feel a whole host of other sensations as well. Whether love evokes desire, in the case of “To His Coy Mistress”, or anger, in the case of “The Sick Rose”, these poets concur that it will always stir up some separate feelings as it progresses. It is interesting that all of these poems were written by men, supposedly about their love for the women who are traditionally meant to bow to their every whim. However, the women in these poems went totally against tradition and did not obey their ‘masters’. As well as love being presented in different ways in these poems there are also different types of love being presented but, the fact remains, whether the poets were writing about their love being ‘vegetable’ or otherwise, they were all affected by it whether they liked it or not.
Kayleigh Fitzgerald 10H