In the third stanza, Duffy moves onto the negative side of love. As love progresses “it will blind you with tears” here, the poet uses the tears caused by cutting an onion to illustrate how the excitement of love causes a person to focus on nothing but their lover, overlooking the rest of the world around them. Also, Duffy implies how a person also gets blinded to their lover’s faults and instead focuses on their good features. Another negative affect caused by love are the relationship troubles “…your reflection a wobbling photo of grief” shedding tears while in love is unavoidable –similar to crying while cutting an onion– scarring the relationship. The “photo” represents their happy memories, which became depressing and heartbreaking to remember. To defend her negative thoughts on love, Duffy states that she is “trying to be truthful” this supports how she’s greatly affected by love, and is exploring it thoroughly.
Carol Ann Duffy suggests how love is passionate “its fierce kiss will stay on your lips”, a kiss which is usually sweet is contrasted with “fierce” to exaggerate how the kiss is full of feeling, leaving a stinging feeling on the lips. The word “fierce” also implies an animal like characteristic provoked by love, as the animal attacks its prey in a “possessive” way. The poet also brings up a person’s want for a never ending relationship “faithful as we are, for as long as we are” but in reality, love ends as soon as the “possessive” need for each other dies out. The poets negative thoughts of a long lasting love are reinforced in “…shrink it to a wedding ring if you like. Lethal” Duffy gives the option of marriage, even though she’s against it and believes that it’ll end badly. The phrase “shrink it to a wedding ring” emphasises the weakening of love, especially after marriage as it becomes “lethal” and deadly. The wedding ring will become a burden “will cling to your fingers, cling to your knife” the repetition of the verb “clings” implies the painful grip marriage causes, which is then reinforced by the word “knife” as it slices and hurts the former lovers.
In the poem Funeral Blues by W.H. Auden, the poet is mourning over the death of his lover. The poet ignores everything and directs all his attention on the funeral of his lover “stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone… silence the pianos” as if the outside world is frozen and unchanging. Auden also hints his want for respect towards his lover for requesting “silence” and his anxiety in “bring out the coffin, let the mourners come” as if impatiently wanting to start mourning over his love. The word “coffin” symbolises the death of their love, along with his lover, that their love is forever gone and buried away.
In the second stanza, Auden mentions “aeroplanes circle moaning the sky” here, the “aeroplanes” is a metaphor for the mourners, as their wails of sadness fill the air around him, “scribbling on the sky the message He Is Dead” the constant crying of the mourners seem to be mocking the poet, always confirming his lovers death, reminding him that he’s never coming back. As the poem continues, the poet realises how truly important his lover was to him “he was my north… my Sunday rest… my talk, my song” this indicates that he was his lover was everything to him, from the most ordinary “my Sunday rest” to the most wonderful “my song”, conveys how powerful their love was and how much it affected them. Auden describes his love as his “week”, “noon” and “midnight” comparing him to time, which is never ending and always present, implying their future together. Their love was so strong that Auden was certain for a future together, never imagining of a life without him “I thought that love would last forever: I was wrong”, this reinforces how their love has died, that his everything is dead, and therefore part of him is dead as well.
At the end of the poem, Auden’s perspective of life changes “the stars are not wanted… pack up the moon… pour away the ocean” the world has lost its appeal, life has become meaningless and useless. The stars, moon and oceans which usually hold amazing beauty, have become worthless and featureless, similar to the poets life. In the last verse, Auden has completely given up on life “for nothing now can ever come to any good” he doesn’t see any future for him, he is blinded by his dead lover, nothing can make him happy anymore.
