Before you were mine quotations

"I'm ten years away"

Ownership of mum is inevitable

Vividly imagined based of a photograph

"With your pals maggie and Jean"

Real names adds honesty and authenticity to the speaker- gives impression these are real people

"Bend from the waist"

Giddy exuberance- mother is really enjoying herself and lost in the moment

Visual imagery to create a vivid picture of mothers youthful vivacity

"Polka dot dress.. "

Mother wears fashionable young dress

Summer imagery

"Marilyn"

Admiration of mum as Marilyn Monroe due to her beauty and her popularity in her mind

Like Marilyn's famous pose of her dress blowing around

"I'm not here yet "

Dramatic short sentence to emphasise speakers absence

"The thought of me doesn't occur"

Mother didn't think of motherhood at this age- speaker assumes mother was loving her life in order to have her

"The thousand eyes"

She is centre of attention

Resembles to a mirrorball with lights reflecting all over the room like a thousand eyes

Marilyn imagery again with paparazzi

"Fizzy, movie tomorrows the right walk home could bring"

Promise of youth- you could become anyone or anything

She is young with a whole life ahead of her

"Fizzy" suggests champagne perhaps and glamour. Though champagne doesn't stay fizzy for long just like mothers youth

"Movie" Romance and drama

"Before you were mine"

Possessive- speaks to mother as though she is her own child

Reinforces that children dominate their parents lives

"Your ma.. with a hiding for the late one"

Image of mother-daughter relationship with speakers mother shown to be rebellious and her own mother being strict

"The decade ahead of my loud,possessive yell was the best one, eh?"

Speaker feels that mother lost something by having the child- life was better before she was a mother

Humour

"High-heeled red shoes,relics"

Shift to speakers childhood

More glamorous clothing to symbolise the kind of person mother used to be

Metaphor- shoes are like an ancient treasure dug up by the daughter implying that the life they symbolise is gone

"Cha cha cha!.. on the way home from mass"

Juxtaposition of ideas that mother is teaching daughter Latin dance steps on the way home from catholic mass on a Sunday

Perhaps reflects the two sides of mother- youthful exuberance but then her more severe parenting

"Stamping stars from the wrong pavement"

The pavement in her mind is Hollywood boulevard with its stars

Brings poem full circle back to start with pavement from mothers youth but things are no longer the same as they were

"Before I was born"

Tactic- acknowledgement of the responsibility- the blame

"Sparkle and waltz and laugh "

Polysyndeton and rule of three to summarise her mother was once glamour, sociable and happy

"Before you were mine"

Last repetition of possessive idea