1. Original Text
Yes! in the sea of life enisled,
With echoing straits between us thrown,
Dotting the shoreless watery wild,
We mortal millions live alone.
The islands feel the enclasping flow,
And then their endless bounds they know.
But when the moon their hollows lights,
And they are swept by balms of spring,
And in their glens, on starry nights,
The nightingales divinely sing;
And lovely notes, from shore to shore,
Across the sounds and channels pour—
Oh! then a longing like despair
Is to their farthest caverns sent;
For surely once, they feel, we were
Parts of a single continent!
Now round us spreads the watery plain—
Oh might our marges meet again!
Who order'd, that their longing's fire
Should be, as soon as kindled, cool'd?
Who renters vain their deep desire?—
A God, a God their severance ruled!
And bade betwixt their shores to be
The unplumb'd, salt, estranging sea.
2. Reaction to the poem
The beginning of the poem seems to emit a feeling of sadness and loneliness that one feels when they are disconnected from others. During the poem, I was hit by the words "We mortal millions live alone," and I felt that it portrayed a unique emotion of anger at all those whose lives are too short for hating and bearing grudges. The next part of the poem surprised me because it seemed to talk about something that could be, a sort of glimmer of hope that seems to allude to the connections against all odds. During the third stanza, it seems as though such hope and connection has been thrown out and a rift has been caused as deep as an ocean and far reaching as the crevices of one’s mind. The last stanza makes me understand his anger for such events and confusion as to why these things are happening.
3. Paraphrase the poem
In the world of the living with islands all around,
With large distances separating us,
Living all through this world of ours,
We humans live privately hiding our feelings and thoughts.
All humans feel the flow and stirring of life,
And understand the different paths and courses their life can take.
But when people begin to show themselves to others,
And they are engulfed by the feelings and emotions that bloom around them,
And deep inside them on dark days with a few lights,
Love and goodness begins to spread;
And words of welcome and friendship spread from person to person,
Across all the other background noise and distances that are part of daily life-
Ouch! Then an eternal sadness and pain
Is felt in the deepest part of their hearts;
Because people remember the times when all were
Together as one and friends to all!
Now all there that is left is rifts that split up everyone from even the closest of friends-
If only our strength could bring us back together!
Who decreed that our love and feelings
Should be destroyed as soon as they bloomed?
Who owns you so that they can decide your deepest wants?-
An absolute ruler who has all power must have passed a law to split us!
And decided that their life and feelings to be
Poisonous and strange to me.
4. SWIFTT
SW = Syntax/Word Choice
The words that the author used, seemed to bring out at some times a sense of longing or sadness but at other times showed anger or joy. By using the world echoing in line 2 of the poem, the author was able to make use understand how large of an expanse the rift between him and his lover really was. Another time in line 6, the author uses the word endless to try to add the effect of something beyond our comprehension and imagination. The author also uses words such as starry and divinely, to give a feeling of beauty and hope during a dark time. The author also uses words such as estranging when referring to the sea to indicate loneliness and indifference. Such wording that gives off a feeling of sadness, anger, and hope shows the amount of emotion the author put into the poem.
I = Imagery
The first part of the poem uses imagery to allow readers to picture deep and wide expanses between islands to describe the distance and distrust between people. Words such as echoing, shoreless, and endless, allows readers to feel the deepness of the words. During the second stanza, the author uses imagery to allow readers to feel the glimmer of understanding and feeling between others. It allows us to understand the joy of friendship, like the song of a bird in the morning. During the third stanza, the author uses words such as farthest and plains to allow us to feel that the expanse is so far and deep it seems almost impossible that everyone used to be together. The author uses words such as fire, God, and estranged sea during the last stanza to give us a sense of anger and finality to the decisions that were made, which ended in a calm and eerie sea.
F = Figurative Language
Caverns, islands, seas, oceans, continents; all these words are part of complex figurative description of people, their hearts, the space and distance between, and friendship and closeness. The author uses figurative language to relate islands to people who are in a "sea of life," which is the world around them. The nightingale refers to hope and beauty in a time of darkness before something amazing. The author indicates that caverns are actually the hearts of others and that a continent is a group of people who are joined together through bonds. The author also uses God as a figure of speech that is referring to an absolute law or decision. The author uses a clever series of figures of speech to connect bodies of water and land to humans and how the interact while never bringing up people completely.
T = Tone
The initial tone of the poem is sad and forlorn and gives a feeling of separation and distance between others. The author uses words such as alone, shoreless, and endless to give a sort of empty feeling. The tone of the poem is also thoughtful and angry at the distance between people and the decision to split a continent and create small islands that are left to their own devices. The tone of the poem gives a weariness of someone who tried so hard to create bonds with the one they love but have trouble with getting someone's affection.
T = Theme
Theme of the poem revolves around a change of heart of a lover or someone that the author loved. It seems as though the author centers his writing on the space between others and the distrust and dislike between people. The theme also contains anger at separation and hate at anyone who changed his lovers mind towards him.
5. Conclusion
Parts of my intial reaction were incorrect in regards to the overall tone and feeling. At first I thought that most of the poem was filled with anger and hurt, but it seems that the poem centered around the distance and loneliness of a man. It portrays islands and seas as men and the coldness around them. I feel that the poem argued at the injustice of changing one's feelings without ever consulting the other person in the relationship. The poem creates a perfect mixture of anger and sadness at the millions that live alone and at the women who left his side.
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