hi there Nesta from study clicks here you're listening to study click explains our Channel dedicated to bringing you Junior cycle and leaving C notes in podcast form for this podcast we've teamed up with Laura JY an expert teacher who's going to take you through everything you need to know about the poet chamini and his poems that are on the leaving served English syllabus so without further Ado the next voice you're going to hear is [Music] Laura hi there welcome to the study clicks podcast on Sheamus heene my name is Laura Daly I'm an English teacher from Dublin and I'm going to be taking you through an exam focused look at he's poems Heeney is a literary icon a source of cultural pride and a Nobel Prize winner but do not be intimidated in terms of being a leaving Ser poet he is extremely accessible to students and a great choice to focus in on for the exam there are 13 Heeney poems in the course which is a lot so be sure to skip to the ones that your teacher has covered in class remember you need to discuss four in depth and briefly refer to two more for a H1 just like in a leing CT essay I'm going to follow a structure to give this podcast coherence first of all I'm going to tell you a little bit about he's background and his poetic influences giving you a brief cultural context for his poetry and outline some key stylistic features then we will move towards the main section of the podcast analyzing each of the poems on the course with a view to condensing them into bite-size elements to make them easy for you to remember these elements will include looking at themes imagery and sound techniques stylistic features and tone finally I'll give you some top tips in terms of exam prep two background and poetic influences so in terms of he's background we know so much about him it's a case of selecting a few key elements for your essay that will lend to understanding his influences and his social and cultural context the social and cultural context in simple terms means what was happening in society when the poet was growing up or writing that would have impacted their views and therefore their art so who and what influenced Heeney well Heeney was born in County Derry in 1939 and reared on the farm mbon until 1953 after the untimely death of his younger brother caused the family to move many of you will be familiar with the poem midterm break from Junior cycle which deals with his brother's death the farm MOS born and the north feature heavily in he's work both the personal and political aspects are explored in his poetry writing during the troubles means that violence and Irish identity are key issues that emerge in his writing he moved from the north from moson to Belfast and then to the Republic of Ireland living for a time in Wicklow and then Dublin he also spent time working in America the landscape of Ireland and Beyond holds a Fascination for heene becoming a metaphor for creativity and identity in his poems postcript and B land respectively as well as abstract or ideological themes like identity poets are human beings so of course their personal relationships impact their writing and we see this also in he's poetry three of the poems in the course deal with he's wife Marie and the differ stages of their Romance the underground the skunk and Tates Avenue we also see he's relationship with his father feature in many of the poems such as a CO the Harvest bow and the Pitchfork another thing to note about he's influence is that the writing process itself the production of art often a preoccupation of poets is something explored in his poetry we see this in the Forge and the Pitchfork during his lifetime Heeney was widely recognized and had a very successful career he began as an English teacher before becoming a lecturer and full-time poet among his many roles and accolades he was named Boon professor of rhetoric and orry in Harvard one of the University's most prestigious offices he became professor of poetry at Oxford University he served for 5 years on the Arts Council in the Republic of Ireland he was heavily involved in the field a theater company he was made a commander of the order of arts and letters by the French Ministry of culture and he received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1995 however if we are purely focusing on the exam get your pens ready now I'm going to give you a few key bullet points from his biography to take note for your essay one his childhood in Dairy deeply influenced him two growing up in the North and the troubles influenced his perception of violence and Irish identity three the natural world features in his poetry four his relationships with his wife and father are important sources of creativity five he writes about the creative process while you have your pens there I'm just going to highlight a couple of key stylistic features that reoccur throughout he's work that you may want to take note of too before we begin to take a closer look at the poems one hey favors a four-line stanza and you'll see this form repeated in his poems two he uses classical allusion mythology in his poems three in terms of language heene often favors compound adjectives lending unique richness to his imagery and four many of his poems feel like you entering halfway through a conversation there's a lovely intimacy to them as a result so let's move now to an overview of each of the poems bogland bogland is a poem about the natural world but on a deeper level it is a commentary about Irish identity we see this subtle shift in perspective from the individual I to the collective pronouns we and are used to write the poem there is a comparison of play in the imagery here between America and Ireland the vastness of the former is contrasted with the depth of the latter the American landscape may be big but our bugs hold the secret of Millennia this is perfectly captured in the imagery of the opening stanza we have have no prairies to slice a big sun at evening everywhere the eye concedes to encroaching Horizon the use of the dash here cleverly slicing the line mirroring the language these lines continue with the Vivid image of how the eye is wooed into the Cyclops eye of a Tarn meaning the sun disappears into a mountain lake the words Cyclops and Tarn lend a mythical aspect to the poem and this is continued in the unearthing of artifacts from the bug artifacts from previous eras the skeleton of the great Irish elk and the butter sunk under more than a hundred years the bog itself is compared to the butter preserved within it the ground itself is a kind black butter its porous nature means that it lacks definition both physically and ideologically missing its last definition by millions of years it is yielding with a hint that one could be ens snared in it melting and opening underfoot a key image in the poem is that of the Pioneers the Irish Pioneers digging down as opposed to to the American Pioneers who journeyed West our Pioneers keep striking inwards and downwards but as always there are layers of metaphorical meaning below the surface just like the layers of the bog the Pioneers may be the Irish artists digging deep in search of inspiration or some definition of identity each layer they strip seems camped on before the sense here is of the deep historical and cultural significance of our island encapsulated in the bug the poem closes with the ambiguous image the wet Center is bottomless this can be interpreted that the Irish landscape and cultural heritage are a bottomless well of both inspiration and pride for the Irish people like all of he's poems the language is infused with a musicality we see sibilance assonance and alliteration throughout the tone is very self- assured and authoritative to an extent hey assumes the voice of the Irish people this is very much a universal poem as opposed to a personal one so to recap have the pens at ready themes the natural landscape Irish identity poetry is a way of searching for a collective identity key images the bog the elk the butter the Pioneers digging down the layers of the bog the bottomless Center stylistic features contrast mystery and mythology the collective pronoun we the tone self assured two the Talen man the Talen man should be ready in conjunction with bogland bogland as we've just seen deals with Irish bogs but the Talen man refers to a bog body found in the Jutland region of Denmark in the 1950s The Bogman died around the fifth century BC and what is presumed was some sort of ritual Human Sacrifice if you've not done so you should Google the images of the Talen man now the way the bog preserved the man is absolutely fascinating and it will bring the imagery of the poem vividly to life the themes of the poem are violence death and rebirth first let's look at a brief overview of the form and content of the poem it has 11 stanzas divided into three distinct sections in the first section heene imagines a trip to our house to see where the bog body reposes in the second section the poet links the bog and its powers to preserve a body to the victims of the war of independence and the troubles in Northern Ireland and in the third section he imagines a Bogman on his way to his ceremonial death and describes how the poet would feel oddly at home in that foreign place Place why heene would feel a familiarity with the place is the Crux of the poem and we will get to it a bit later the poem opens with the wistful someday I will go to our house immediately there's a sense of something desired but is not yet a reality and this is important in relation to the northern Irish context in section 2 the opening stanzas are extremely Vivid as heene gives us a detailed description of the bog body an image full of alliteration his Peach brown head the mild PODS of his eyelids his pointed skin cap the man was thought to be a sacrifice to the goddess nerus goddess of fertility and the language of sex and fertility can be seen throughout naked he is her bridegroom and she opened her Fen those dark juices working him to a Saints kept body the bog has a transformative effect on the man's corpse heene wonders could he risk blasphemy by asking the Talon man to make germinate which means to regrow the bodies of those lost to violence at Ireland the imagery here becomes violent and the tone becomes menacing the victims of Ireland's bloody history are remembered in graphic terms his first image of violence in reference to the war of independence the scattered ambushed flesh of laborers stocking corpses laid out in the farmyards the language used scattered flesh evokes total revulsion in the reader this brutalization of the bodies of victims into Parts is continued in the imagery of the next stanza heene references the sectarian murder of four brothers whose bodies were mutilated by dragging them along railway tracks Telltale skin and teeth flecking the sleepers we feel disgust mirrored in the harsh alliterate of tea in this stanza the bodies in fragments are sharply contrasted with the perfectly preserved body of the Talen man we see earlier in the poem the land in Denmark preserving its men the land of Ireland destroying them section three returns us to heene imagination as he visualizes himself journeying through the land where the Talon man made his final Journey on the tumbril Heeney describes how he will feel alien the strange place names in foreign language not knowing their tongue contributing to his feeling lost however the final statement is the Crux of the poem I referred to earlier I will feel lost unhappy at home heene equates being lost and unhappy in the man-killing parishes with being an Ireland this is a particularly cutting compounded adjective in this final stanza the poem is a scathing commentary on our violent past so to recap themes violence sectarian violence death rebirth key images the Talen man the goddess the bog the body parts of the victims of violence stylistic features the personification of the bog is the goddess nerus tone wistful revulsion unhappy critical three mbor two poems in dedication one sunlight mosor was the farm where heene spent his early years and the woman in the poem is his Aunt Mary sunlight is a beautifully simple poem it has the painterly quality of a vermier look up the painting the milk made and you'll see what I mean the poem captures a moment of simple Domesticity full of comfort and love his aunt is baking scones the kitchen is quiet this act of baking is an act of love the poem is divided into seven four-line stanzas but a key stylistic feature is the enjam that gives the poem a laconic flow mirroring the slow pace of the scene depicted this effect is also created by the asant the long o sound we see throughout the opening image as with all poems is important he begins there was a sunlet absence part of the farmyard is in Shadow and yet water honeyed in the Heat and the siil and simile the sun stood like a griddle cooling against the wall playfully contradicts his earlier assertion this poem is about light and Shadow Illuminating the love in the scene but the words are never spoken aloud between heene and his aunt stanas 34 and 5 concerning the active baking her hands scuffled over the bake board then the focus slowly turns towards his ant broad lapped with whitening nails and meing shins the realism of the imagery here is refreshing in our world of edited Perfection one of the most significant lines in the poem is the simple statement here is space again time is suspended and the moment is reflective and meditative The Tick of two clocks lends no urgency only a rhythm to the scene the final stanza contains the cruxs of the poem and here is love Heeney finishes with a clever simile and here is love like a tin Smith scoop sunk past its gleam in the meal bin so much of the affection between the aunt and nephew is unsaid sunk like the scoop but there nonetheless so to recap themes Domesticity in all its simple Beauty love key images the sunlight and heat the images of the ant baking and sitting The Tick of two clocks here is space love like a sunk scoop stylistic features painterly quality of the imagery light and Shadow tone meditative appreciative loving four a constable cause it is interesting to analyze a conable cause alongside Moss born one sunlight because both deal with Encounters in the family home yet while one is familiar and full of love the other is chilling and full of threat remember that linking your poems like this throughout your leaving essay is important in creating a cohesion as discussed earlier heene was a Catholic growing up in Northern Ireland at a time when Catholics were marginalized and largely underrepresented in the Royal ulcer constabulary or or the conable has called to do a tax return on he's father's crops from the farm and seen Through The Eyes of the child it is an ominous f it an interesting technique used in the poem to dehumanize the Constable is cicy sicy is when a part is used to represent the ho in this case the boot of the law the Constable is representative of Law and justice but he represents the violence and oppression of it as seen in the word boot the Constable is continuously fragmented Yung heene sees only the acutts of his position the cap the polished holster revolver but the heavy Ledger and the Doomsday Book he cannot see beyond these symbols of par and violence to see the man as a whole person the voice in the poem The Power of language also belongs to the Constable save for a tur no from he's father the Constable is the interrogator and person in control any other root crops mangals marrow stems anything like that in fact the young boy is so intimidated by the visit he questions the veracity of his father's statement was there not a line of turn-ups for the seed Rite in the potato field his uncertainty and naivity means that he assumes small guilts and sat Imagining the black hole in the barracks the black hole here is important for the sheer Terror it represents an Annihilation at the hands of the law and the tone created by the forceful alliteration in these lines is oppressive because we share y he's fearful perspective of the visit the effect on the reader is one of feeling disconcerted the anticipation of the ticking bomb cleverly alluded to in the automatic AIC final line and the bicycle ticked ticked ticked creates an unbearable tension especially because as readers we know the tragedy of the trouble lies ahead for Northern Ireland the final line is in this way devastatingly premonitory so to recap themes power and power structures violence oppression key images all the images associated with the Constable his bike the Doomsday Book stylistic features cynic Dei anamara the direct speech of the Constable tone threatening fearful ominous five a call a call is another memory of he's father and the themes are love and mortality it describes a phone call he makes to his parents and while his mother goes to call his father in from the garden to talk to him Heeney pictures his father in his Mind's Eye suddenly he is struck by the mortality of his aging parent and a deep sense of love for him the poem opens with the the voice of he's mother the use of direct speech gives the poem a sense of immediacy and a casualness to begin with she goes out to get he's father who is weeding her reference to the fact that the weather hears my emphasis so good creates a sense of physical distance between the son and his parents a distance that the phone call is trying to diminish HEI pictures his father gardening a man of action emphasized by the use of the verbs touching inspecting separating pulling he is gently extracting the frail and leafless stalks a subtle metaphor for the aging process and death he is satisfied in his work but an undercurrent of sadness is alluded to pleased to feel each little weed root break but ruthful also we left wondering what has caused the father's Melancholy heene visual is interrupted by the hour image of the clocks ticking in the Silence of his parents far away Hall then found myself listening to the Amplified grave ticking of Hall clocks Gra here it means serious but it is also an illusion to death and a few lines later heene describes the sunstruck pendulums pendulums are often stopped when someone in a house died this gives rise to a philosophical thought the poet repurposes the Medievil morality plays which feature the characters every man and the personification of death and imagines that nowadays death would merely make a phone call to their victim to summon them to the afterlife if it were nowadays this is how death would summon every man it is a morbid thought and one that overwhelms Heeney because when he is interrupted by the voice of his father he proclaims I nearly said I loved him it is the word nearly that makes this concluding line so poignant Heeney feels deep love for his father but is unable to express it out loud the form of this poem differs from many of the others there are irregular stanzas and the use of ellipses gives it a slow Meandering feel that is then sharply interrupted by his musings on mortality and his Undeclared f I love it is an ordinary moment suffused with the extraordinary acknowledgement of our most human conditions our ability to love and our mortality so to recap themes a son's love mortality key images the father gardening the clocks in the hall the morality play and the characters of every man and death stylistic features the direct speech of he's mother tone loving poignant undercurrent of melancholy six the Harvest bow a harvest bow was made of straw worn on the lapel of a jacket in celebration of the end of harvest they were also given a small love tokens in the poem heene is speaking to his father remembering a harvest bow that he made when heene was a child and the poem moves between past and present adult heene has that same bow on his dresser and it makes him nostalgic the poem is in Praise of his father's craftsmanship and character in the first Stan a heene addresses his father directly and recalls him platting the Harvest bow seemingly infusing the wheat with his own mellowed silence the image of the Father Here is a cam person a person who does not talk unnecessarily perhaps someone who takes pride in their work the bow is outwardly described as a throw away love not yet heene has kept it and in the final stanza we see how he cherishes its symbolism the second stanza focuses on the father's work-worn hands hands that have aged hands involved in manual labor and yet hands that could do delicate creative work too as seen in the image hands harked to their gift and worked with fine intent until your fingers moved somnambulant it is done with such skill it is almost as if he is doing it in his sleep heene the master crafter of words is admiring his father's gift his craftsmanship and skill the end of the second stanza moves back to the present with Heeney holding the bow in his hands gleaning the unsaid off the palpable I love love this image it's so evocative palpable means something you can touch and feel but it also means a feeling that is so strong that you can touch it the unsaid could mean a few things here so there's a lovely ambiguity at play ultimately I read it that Heeney feels his father's love when he holds the bow when he looks through the bow in the third stanza spy into its golden Loops he is again brought back to his childhood this time he is on an evening walk with his father in the fields of mossor the farm he grew up one but was subsequently sold as referenced by the auction notice on the a house wall Heeney describes how he was already homesick for the big lift of those evenings perhaps meaning he was anticipating the family's imminent departure from mosor but also acknowledging the transience of that special time with his father the big lift being how he was emotionally boyed by such intimate evenings in the final stanza heene quotes a poem saying the mar of this frail device the bow could be the end of art is peace and again this line defies a single interpretation it could mean when an artist finishes his work he finally gets peace or more probably that the end goal of any artistic Endeavor is political its aim is for peace these peaceful pastoral images of Father and Son stand in sharp contrast with the violence associated with the North in Irish Consciousness is heene offering an alternative image a peaceful image as a representation of his homeland or is it a utopian idealistic image that he craves returns to the north the final simile of the bow like a drawn snare describes how the spirit of the corn itself has managed to escape from the trap is this a reference to he's move out of Northern Ireland during the troubles that he has managed to slip out of danger ultimately the poem is an intimate portrait of a father and his admiring son in terms of form it has a steady AA BB CC rhyming pattern throughout and it gives it a lovely steady Rhythm a pattern just like the pattern his father followed in making the bow the enjam contributes to the flow of the poem mirroring the mandering Walk of Father and Son through the long grass and midies so to recap themes fatherson relationship craftsmanship and skill the political purpose of art key images the bow his father's hands the big lift the motto the simile of the snare stylistic features the rhyming scheme inment tone nostalgic admiration intimate dactic seven the pitch workk the Pitchfork should be read in conjunction with the Harvest bow as it also celebrates he's father in this poem the PO EES Confluence to merge the imagery of the Pitchfork with his father he highlights his admiration for both the man and the tool he uses in this beautiful lyric poem some interpretations see the he in the poem as y heene but for this reading the he is assumed to be he's father as the poem comes from a collection that mourned his father's passing the poem is also a meditation on the art of writing poetry in the opening lines we once again see the stylistic technique so often favored by heene where we feel as if we have entered midc conversation of all the implements the pitch work was the one that came near to an imagined Perfection this imagined Perfection is because of the transformation the father undergoes in young he's eyes when he handles the pitch work he becomes a warrior or athlete and a worker Allin one he uses a simile to say that it felt like a javelin accurate in light it becomes a weapon in his father's skilled hands and classical images of the hero are evoked here the accurate and light show the father's skill and strength respectively the tone is admiration and awe the language in the third stanza is unusual in that nearly the entire stanza is a list of descriptors of the Pitchfork and by extension his father it is described as being sweat cured here is the compound adjective which makes he's imagery so individual the implication is that hard work has almost curated and refined the tool just as a writer curates and refines a poem The springiness is suggestive of his father's Youth and vitality balanced is a testament to the calm and quiet nature we observed in the Harvest bow there is definitely a masculinity associated with the Pitchfork through the language chosen the instrument itself is described in quite phallic terms at times the poem becomes even more symbolic of the writing process in the final two stanzas he describes his father Imagining the Flight of the Pitchfork he would see the shaft of a pitchfork sailing past but this flight can be seen as a metaphor for flights of imagination the father has learned to let go of controlling the outcome of the throw let's look closer at the final stanza has learned at last to follow that simple lead past its own aim out to another side where Perfection or nearness to it is imagined not in the aiming but the opening hand metaphorically speaking heene has learned that perfection in writing or the closest thing to it comes not from what you believe is the aim of the piece but the vulnerability that occurs during the process the opening hand how it lands in the consciousness of the reader is out of his control like his father before him he can only trust the process and follow that simple lead his imagination there is something almost metaphysical hinted at here in the skill of the two men the soft sibling of the pitwork sailing past evenly imperturbably through space its prongs Starlet and absolutely soundless has connotations of the transcendental quality of poetry its ability to Traverse space and time is evoked here so to recap themes his admiration of his father's skill and masculine prowess the art of writing as imag of Flights of Fancy and vulnerability key images the Pitchfork and the plethora of adjectives used to describe it the warrior and athlete the pitch floor flying through space the opening hand stylistic features compounded adjectives feeling as we have entered a conversation that's already begun repetition of perfection tone awe admiration Pride trust in relation to the creative process eight the forge let's begin with some technical language in relation to the structure of the poem and get it out of the way the forge is a petar Sonet a 14line poem with a set rhyming scheme yet it is Loosely in iambic pentameter which is associated with Shakespearean sonets I Amic pentameter is aligned with 10 syllables five stressed and five unstressed which lends the poem a rhythmic beat what makes it a p trar and Sonet is that it is divided into an octave the first eight lines and a sedet the final six lines between the octave and the CET there is a Volta which means a turn or a change in focus of the pole you will not need to explain all this in the exam but if you are aiming for a H1 it's crucial that you can confidently use the words Sonet octave ceset Volta and diamic pentameter throughout your analysis of this poem on the surface the poem is about a forge and a blacksmith who works within it but as with most poems there are layers of me meaning to be unraveled by The Listener in this case the deeper meanings in the poem concern creativity craftsmanship and how certain acts are dying in the face of encroaching modernity the craftsmanship of the blacksmith which heene so admires is an extended metaphor for the craftsmanship of the poet himself his ability to walk through the door into the dark the alliterative opening image captures how poetry is a journey into the recesses of a poet's mind and Imagination the whole poem is littered with sound ring hiss clatter grunts slam anomaa bringing to life the work of the Smith and the noisy Forge a H1 tip is that any technique that reoccurs to ra a poem such as anamat in this poem must be mentioned in your analysis of the poem so let's first look at the octave which focuses on the workings within the forge and then move to the CET where after the VTA the poem switches Focus to the blacksmith self the door into the dark immediately lends a sense of mystery to the poem this mystery is continued with the alchemical work of the blacksmith the unpredictable fanil of Sparks or hiss when a shoe toughens in water the unpredictability of the creative process and its transformative nature are captured in this Vivid image the magical and spiritual essence of creativity is Illustrated when Heeney compares the Anvil to an altar his tone is one of reverence and awe when the poem switches Focus to the Smith in the seset it celebrates the Mastery of the man who expends himself in shape and music his job is physical but not without a beauty of its own the tone changes sharply here to one of nostalgia for Times Gone by as he recalls a clatter of hoofs where traffic is flashing in Rose the blacksmith and his work appear anachronistic in this modern world an these skill trades are becoming defunct with increasing improvements in technology and automation the poem comes from a collection published in 1969 but this anxiety still exists today if not even more so the skill trade of the Smith as I've mentioned before is comparable to the work of the poet and the poem contains he's anxiety that his work May too be undervalued but this anxiety is discarded in the final lines of the poem as the poet asserts that the Smith Grunts and goes in with a slam and a flick to beat real iron out to work the Bellows this idea of beating real iron is a very masculine image Heeney surmises that the work has intrinsic value and will continue on so to recap themes the creative process lost starts key images the octave the door into the dark the fantel of Sparks the Anvil as the altar the CET shape and music the traffic where Hooves were real iron stylist features sound permeates the poem Ana tone mystery all Nostalgia nine the underground outwardly the underground is a poem about he's honeymoon in London when he and his wife Marie took a tube to a concert in the Albert Hall when reading the poem it's important to contextualize it the heis were Catholics who married in the 1960s a time when sex outside of marriage was illicit so often People's First sexual experiences happened on honeymoon in fact the underground is an incredibly sexual poem full of the heedy chemistry of a newly married couple it is a poem about love and sex tension and gratification the opening Stan sets the scene vividly the couple are running through the vaulted tunnel of the tube and there is an urgency to it with the continued use of the present participle the ing form throughout running speeding gaining the imagery has all the Hallmarks of an oldfashioned courtship the idea of the chase is evoked and playing hard to get as his wife is speeding ahead Out Of Reach classical illusion of which he is so fond also features in this opening stanza and contributes to the sexual connotations he uses a simile to compare himself to pan who ardently pursued the virginal Spirit shrinkx who turns herself into a re to avoid his advances and me me then like a fleet God gaining upon you before you turned into a reed the second stanza goes on to compare his wife to a new white flower japed with Crimson here he uses white to represent his wife's virginity and the Crimson to represent the loss of it her buttons come off her coat as she runs ahead almost as if she's undressing before him or he wishes it so as the coat flapped wild and button and button sprang off and fell in a trail the repetition of button and the energetic verb sprung adds tension here the pace of the third stanza slows as asant abounds honeymooning Moonlighting Moonlighting can be doing something illicit the main metaphor in the third stanza is the child story of Hansel and grle he Compares himself to Hansel picking up the breadcrumbs as they retrace their steps after the concert yet the use of the fairy tale imagery belies the sexuality of the lines and now I come as Hansel came on the moonlit Stones retracing The Path back lifting the buttons there is a shift in tone again in the final stanza and yet another classical illusion the metaphor used by heene is that of the story of orus and uicy uicy was stolen by Hades and brought to the underworld orus was allowed to take her back on one condition as she followed him out of the underworld he was not allowed to look back he looked back and lost her forever again while it's important you know this story to understand the image you do not have to explain it in the exam heene sexual appetite appears not to have been quenched and he compares the empty phallic tracks to himself the wet track be and tensed as I am the final line is ambiguous while it is a poem about love and intimacy it is also about early love there is erotic tension but perhaps all is not perfect in the young Lover's relationship Heeney is acutely aware of his wife's step behind him your step following but he fears he will lose her if he looks back just like orus lost idy the metaphor here contains certain anxieties about trust and a wife following a husband's path is there a more guarded tone in this final stanza than the intimacy we saw earlier in the poem is the idea that Heeney is leading his wife from the underworld that he is her Escape Route somewhat self-important so to recap themes love sex eroticism early marriage tension in relationships key images pan and shrinks white flower with Crimson Hansel and grle the buttons the wet track orus and uicy stylistic features classical illusion sexual language tone excited intimate tense 10 the skunk it is a good idea to follow analysis of the underground with the skunk both deal with the subject of Haney's marriage to his wife Marie however as we've just seen the underground is about the beginning of their marriage while the skunk was written much later in their relationship and is a much more playful poem hey spent time in California working away from his wife and as the cliche goes absence makes the heart grow fonder he wrote her love letters and everyday things such as the eucalyptus and wine reminded him of her absence during this time heene would see a skunk at night like a visitor once home with his wife he suddenly reminded of the skunk and draws a comparison between the two not the most flattering of comparisons perhaps but while his desire and love for his wife are no doubt in Earnest the metaphor is meant playfully the poem opens with another unusual comparison the skunk's tale is compared to the black and white garment worn by a priest at a funeral mass the tale is so striking that paraded the skunk there is a sense of the skunk flaunting herself here the poem has from the outset a sense of voyerism or scopophilia the poet himself proclaiming in the third stanza I began to be tense as a Voyer as he watches first the skunk and in the final stanza his wife the poem is an extremely sensuous poem appealing to all five senses and immersing us in the poet's experience we see Vivid visual imagery in the skunker self Aral imagery lends an immediacy to the scene the refrig refrigerator whinnied into silence the skunk snuffing the boards all Factory imagery which appeals to our sense of smell occurs when heene imagines inhaling the scent of his wife off a cold pillow the sense of taste is evoked in gustatory imagery with the Tang of the eucalyptus and the mouthful of wine even tactile imagery appears in the composition of the Love Letters to his absent wife the poem is truly a riot For The Senses an important element in the poem that you must mention apart from its sensuous nature is the idea of a marriage transforming over time we see this when heene talks about the word wife had mutated their relationship has shifted we see this later in the succinct mythologized demythologized although he is referring to the skunk here the skunk is a metaphor for his wife perhaps at the beginning of a romantic relationship there is a certain mystery But as time progresses the myth of romance becomes the reality of marriage demythologized this is not to say that the chemistry between husband and wife has diminished we see in the final lines a sexual suggestiveness your head down tail up hunt in the bottom drawer for the black plung line night dress the poem is about love and absence but also a celebration of his wife who ignites all his senses so to recap themes love desire the unfolding of relationships over time key images the skunk the final two lines of the wife searching for the night dress stylistic features metaphor abundance of sensuous imagery tone playful longing loving 11 Tate's Avenue Tate hav used the third poem on the course that deals with he's relationship with Marie in this poem he uses three different rugs to illustrate three different periods in their romance in the first stanza heene is recording a specific rug rooting a time in his relationship in a memory associated with a physical object he dismisses the first rug not the brown and fawn car rug this was a rug used perhaps a little while into their courtship when they were in a comfort zone but before their marriage before sex we see this in the image of the rug it's Vestal folds unfolded Vestal here is a classical illusion to the Vestal virgins the relationship is comfortable but there's a neutrality even the colors of the rug are neutral Brown Fawn sepia colored the rug is spread on the Sand by the sea but breathing land breaths this image is full of beautiful soft sibilance and alliteration adding to the comfortable tone of this stanza he also dismisses the second rug which is contrasted to the first this one is scraggy and bears the marks of Reckless abandon it is covered in crusts and eggshells and Olive stones and cheese and salami rinds the use of polycon the repetition of and adding to the idea of excess and Indulgence this rug was in Spain beside the Torrance where they got drunk before a bull fight it is depicted as a time of heedy excitement and passion it is the third rug the one they sat on earliest in their relationship that he wishes to recall a rug they sat on in a Belfast backyard and this is where the title of the poem comes from Tates Avenue is the street in Belfast the description of this rug is of a locked Park Sunday Belfast rug alluding to the puritanical nature of Belfast at that time when the parks would have been locked to observe the sabbath the character of this rug is not remembered in as much detail instead it is the interplay between the two characters resting on it there is a silence as one reads a page is turned itself a metaphor for a new chapter of their Liv's beginning heene senses are heightened as he is acutely aware of Marie's movements a finger Twirls warm hair and the feeling of the ground underneath the rug I lay at my length and felt the lumpy earth Keen sensed more than ever through discomfort here heene is describing both his stubborn nature and his ability to sit with discomfort the outwardly ordinary moment was significant for them in that they came to an understanding of each other's personalities when we moved I had your measure and you had mine the tone here is sort of mutual admiration felt between the couple something to note in the poem is he's use of compound adjectives again land breaths locked Park and Keen sensed as mentioned in the introduction to the podcast these unique adjectives lend a liveliness but also an individuality to he's imagery so to recap themes love stages in a relationship key images metaphor of the three rugs the brown one on the beach the Scraggy one in Spain the Belfast rug at the beginning of their relationship stylistic features compound adjectives tone reminiscent nostalgic content admiration 12 postcript postcript is where the term PS in written letters comes from it means written after so the whole poem is like an afterthought and it reads almost like a stream of Consciousness this is accentuated by the inment there are only two full stops and by the fact that the poem begin begins with the conjunction and as if part of the sentence has already been said it is a beautiful nature poem praising the rugged natural beauty of the county Clair Coastline and the impact that the natural world can have on a human heart at unexpected moments to go beyond the superficial the poem is also about aging as well as transients trying to capture a moment and the uselessness of the Endeavor the opening line reads like one friend offering friendly advice to another the tone is warm and inviting and sometime make the time to drive out west into County Clair along the flaggy shore this repetition of time is subtle yet significant it hints at the relentlessness of the passage of time and the poet is warning us to take Leisure Time to observe what is around us the poet advises the listeners to go in September or October and months of the year representing the seasons are important these are months of change a transition towards winter the weather is wild and the comfort of Summer is gone Heeney wrote the poem in his later years his September or October and again alludes to the theme of the passage of time which is captured later in the line you are neither here nor there a hurry through which known and strange things pass the ambiguity in this line is wonderful as the reader tries to find their own definition of what the known and strange things might be the key imagery of the poem is the natural world the elements of the landscape that impacted the poet on his journey the sea the stones of the burn the lake and the swans are Lighting on it let's look first at the illit of image when the wind and the light are working off each other there's a lovely playfulness in this image it is one of Harmony among the natural elements the wildness of the ocean is mirrored when a flock of swans disturb the surface of a slate gray Lake the metaphor used here is a particularly Vivid one the flock of swans are compared to a bolt of lightning striking the Earth as they reach the lake the surface of the slate gray lake is lit by by the earthed lightning of a flock of swans the swans themselves are described with soft alliteration and Vivid repetition of their color their feathers roughed and ruffling white on white the poet changes from Observer documenting what he sees to thinker analyzing the impact of it useless to think you'll Park and capture it more thoroughly this line is interesting because although he doesn't try to capture it at that exact moment the very Act of writing the poem is an attempt to do so in retrospect is Heeney making a commentary on how Arts attempt to capture the beauty of the natural world in fact pales in comparison to the experience of the real thing a top tip for the exam is that it is okay to ask one or two rhetorical questions such as this as part of your analysis it acknowledges that when it comes to poetry we don't have all the answers the final lines of the poem focus on the impact the experience had on heene as big soft buffetings come at the car sideways and catch the heart off guard and blow it open I love the vulner ility of these lines the poet has been moved by this scene of natural beauty and it shows how a sense of wonder and awe need not deteriorate with age so to recap themes the beauty and impact of Nature transience and aging trying to capture a moment and the uselessness of the Endeavor our sense of all key images time the journey Motif September October the sea the stones of the buron the lake and the swans Lighting on it the heart istic features soft alliteration tone conversational intimate awe 13 Lightnings 8 the anal say Lightnings 8 the anal say is probably the poem that coheres the least with the other poems on the course my advice would be that if you've covered it in class use it as one of the poems you refer to briefly as opposed to analyzing it in depth in your essay the poem was about a story that survives in the records from Clon mcno Monastery it is a a Fantastical story about how a ship appeared to the monks while they were all at prayers inside the oratory the ship's anchor gets stuck on the altar rails in the second stanza in the third stanza A crewman shinnied and grappled down the rope and struggled to release it upon seeing this the Abbot claims this man can't bear our life here and will drown unless we help him they free the ship and the man climbs back into the ship the poem finishes with the cryptic line the man climbed back out of The Marvelous as he had known it the poem is an expiration of the mystical or Supernatural and in this final line heene changes the perspective saying that the Sailor also saw the monks as supernatural beings one of the themes of the poem is about offering help even to those you don't understand a metaphor for the relations between the two communities in Northern Ireland the poem is also about heaviness and lightness the massive ship is floating and yet in the second stanza we see the harsh alliterative image halting its course the anchor dragged along behind so deep it hooked itself into the alar rails finally the ship is freed again we see an undercurrent here of imagery about being captured or CAU and freedom so to recap thems the mystical or Supernatural understanding and helping those we may not understand key images the ship the monks the anchor the crewman stylistic features the voice of the Abbott metaphor for the differing communities in the north tone Wonder conclusion now we' recapped all 13 poems here's a couple of final top tips in preparation for the Poetry section which is 12.5% of the overall exam remember the pclm marking scheme at all times P is for purpose am I answering the question asked C is for coherence am I linking my responses coherently L is the marks awarded for language Lively phrasing vocabulary syntax Etc and M is for mechanics spelling and grammar purpose coherence in language or all 30% of the essay's marks and the remaining 10% is for mechanics in terms of revision firstly you must practice planning sample exam questions look up past exam papers mock papers and your textbook for the type of questions that come up about Heeney often the questions can Center on the idea that in he's work he manages to convey the universal in the ordinary if we look at the 2021 question it is a version of this idea it states heene transforms the familiar and mundane through his powerful use of language thereby enabling us to learn a range of profound lessons from his poetry this is essentially asking you to outline all the ordinary things heene writes about but then examine the greater themes he extracts from these familiar things go through your poems and do a quick on line per poem plan this will prepare you to adjust your studied notes to soo the question on the day of the leaving search one of the biggest mistakes students make is just writing down all the notes they can remember without properly referencing the question asked here are some examples of how to plan the 2021 answer very quickly so that it's focused on the question the forge The Familiar is the blacksmith and the forge the lesson is about valuing artistic creativity a constable calls The Familiar is the Constable doing his job the lesson is about oppression and Division in the north from a child's perspective a call The Familiar is making a phone call to his father the the lesson or theme is the realization of our parents mortality our love for them postcript the familiar a beautiful landscape the lesson or theme is the transients of life and artistic inspiration Tates Avenue The Familiar sitting on a rug with his wife the theme the different stages of romantic love and so on secondly when you have practiced gearing your notes towards sample questions write a sample essay and go over the essay with a highlighter anytime you see a word of poetic terminology or a quote from the poet highlight it by poetic terminology I mean theme image simile metaphor personification all the sound techniques alliteration assonance sibilance anomaa or words like hyperbole contrast Etc if your essay is covered in highlighter you are on track for a H1 so to conclude I hope you've enjoyed the podcast heene is certainly a poetic turd of force his language is beautiful and his themes are universally appealing he's a fantastic poet to focus in on for the exam so the very best of look