Compare the way that love is portrayed in two pre-1900's poems: 'The Flea' & 'First Love'.

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Comparing love in poems.

I am going to compare the way that love is portrayed in two pre-1900’s poems: ‘The Flea’ & ‘First Love’.

First Love (1793 – 1864)

The impact of John Clare’s ‘First Love’ is both physical & dramatic. He uses several words and phrases in verse 1 to convey the virtual state of shock that he is in. Some of these are: ‘I ne’er was struck… with love so sudden’. This quote directly relates to the title of the poem. It denotes that he had never been in love before and was caught off-guard. Another is, ‘Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower’. Clare mentions flowers in the first and third verse. His use of flowers is a simile perhaps for the blossoming of his love and also for the beauty of the woman that he loves. My final quote for this verse is ‘My life and all seemed to turn to clay’. This is a very important sentence to the poem as it portrays Clare’s view of love as life, mind & soul altering.

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In verse 2, Clare’s emotions are in turmoil. He tries to describe this by using words & phrases such as, ‘Blood rushed to my face and took my sight’, ‘I could not see a single thing’, ‘Words from my heart… spoke as chords do from the string’ and ‘Blood burnt around my heart’. Clare mentions the loss of sight several times in this verse. In my opinion, Clare is using this as a metaphor to describe how his perception of everything has been altered.

Clare ends the poem with the simple image of snow in winter. Seasons are commonly used ...

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