Anthology - Letters from Yorkshire
In February, digging his garden, planting potatoes,
he saw the first lapwings return and came
indoors to write to me, his knuckles singing
as they reddened in the warmth.
It’s not romance, simply how things are.
You out there, in the cold, seeing the seasons
turning, me with my heartful of headlines
feeding words onto a blank screen.
Is your life more real because you dig and sow?
You wouldn’t say so, breaking ice on a waterbutt,
clearing a path through snow. Still, it’s you
who sends me word of that other world
pouring air and light into an envelope. So that
at night, watching the same news in different houses,
our souls tap out messages across the icy miles.
THEMES:
platonic relationships
familial relationships
distance
communication
nature
FORM:
five tercets
space between represents time and distance between letters
STRUCTURE:
no rhyme scheme
represents casual nature of relationship
represents misalignment and distance
like vignettes
represents gaps while waiting for next letter
enjambment
represents casual nature of relationship
shows that distance doesn’t impact love
LANGUAGE:
colloquial language
temporal deixis - “In February“
alliteration
‘h’ alliteration - “heartful of headlines“
fricatives, personification - “feeding words onto a blank screen“
pronoun shift, direct address - “he saw“, “you out there“, “our souls“
natural imagery
asyndeton, list, plosive alliteration - “digging his garden, planting potatoes, he saw the first lapwings return“
pathetic fallacy, metaphor, synecdoche, sibilance - “our souls tap out messages across the icy miles.“
semantic field of temperature, juxtaposition - “reddened in the warmth“, “in the cold“
metaphors
personification, juxtaposition, synecdoche - “knuckles singing“
light imagery - “pouring air and light into an envelope“
antithesis - “same news in different houses“
CONTEXT:
written by Maura Dooley
born in Cornwall but has lived in London, Bristol and Yorkshire
theme of communication is prevalent in her poetry